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•  •• 

•        * 


AN  EPISTLE  TO  POSTERITY 


BEING    RAMBLING   RECOLLECTIONS    OP 
MANY  TEARS  OF  MY  LIFE 


BY 


M.  E.  W.  SHERWOOD 
It 

AUTHOR  OF   "manners   AND   SOCIAL   USAGES" 
"a  TRANSPLANTED  ROSE"  ETC. 


NEW  YORK  AND  LONDON 

HARPER   &    BROTHERS   PUBLISHERS 

1898 


Copyright,  1897,  by  Harper  &  Brothers. 

All  rightt  retervtd. 


IJ  33eDfcate  tfjfs  33oofe 

TO  MY  SONS 
SAMUEL  SHERWOOD 

AND 

ARTHUR  MURRAY  SHERWOOD 

Ita^  filii  mei  dilectissimi,  vivitote  ut  majoribus  vestris  decori 
sitia,  posteri  vero  memoria  vestra  glorientur  et  honestentur 


umrro 


PREFACE 


EoussEAu  once  sent  to  Yoltaire  an  ode  addressed  to 
Posterity. 

"  Yoici  une  lettre  qui  n'arrivera  jamais  d  son  adresse," 
said  Yoltaire,  in  his  cruel  way. 

Perhaps  this  should  discourage  me  from  attempting 
to  collect  my  rambling  recollections  under  a  title  which 
is  stolen  from  Petrarch ;  but  I  am  encouraged  by  think- 
ing that  Petrarch  will  not  care  for  this  transparent  ap- 
propriation of  his  forgotten  title,  and  I  am  sure  that  I 
shall  not  care  if  Posterity  never  receives  my  letter.  I 
shall  not  be  here  to  watch  for  an  answer. 

And  yet  I  shall  be  glad  if  a  record  of  the  changeful 
times  in  which  I  have  lived  gives  pleasure  to  any  one 
who  reads  my  book  now,  or  to  those  Avho  come  after 
me.  It  has  been  a  remarkable  era.  Progress  has  har- 
nessed several  new  steeds  to  her  car  since  I  started  to 
travel  onward.  Life  is  much  more  full  of  comfort  now 
than  it  has  ever  been.  Some  one  asks,  Is  not  life  stifled 
in  appliances  ?  Are  we  any  happier  than  our  ancestors 
were?  Is  a  single  day  of  Europe  worth  a  cycle  of 
Cathay  ?  Have  we  not  taken  on  some  neuralgias  and 
malarias  and  nervous  prostrations  ?  I  leave  that  ques- 
tion for  Posterity  to  answer,  and  I  am  rather  glad  that 
I  shall  not  be  responsible  for  the  reply. 

But  I  will  answer  Mallock's  question,  "  Is  life  worth 


Vi  PREFACE 

living  ?"  in  the  affirmative.  I  have  found  it  eminently 
so.  Life  has  been  an  enjoyable  experiment,  and  amus- 
ing, in  spite  of  its  sorrows  and  disappointments.  Life 
is  a  success  if  we  can  work  and  laugh.  It  has  been  a 
perpetual  pleasure  to  me  to  see  luxury  march  on  with 
giant  tread ;  to  watch  the  great  city  of  New  York  grow ; 
to  welcome  art  and  beauty  into  our  houses ;  to  see  the 
statues  and  the  buildings  improve  in  every  decade.  It 
has  even  been  a  pleasure  (the  sure  accompaniment  of  ad- 
vancing years)  to  say,  "  Oh,  we  had  greater  geniuses  on 
the  stage  and  in  the  forum,  and  greater  beauties  at  the 
balls,  in  the  old  time !"  That  gentle  murmur  of  com- 
plaint is,  however,  lost  in  the  magnificent  march  of  the 
coming  centuries.  Quite  worth  while  it  is  to  have  seen 
the  transition  period. 

M.  E.  W.  S. 


CONTENTS 


CHAPTER  I 

Early  Days  in  New  Hampshire— My  ^atlier  and  Mother— Mr.  Emer- 
son's School  at  Boston — Daniel  Webster  at  Marsh  field— Visit  to 
Washington— "Tyler  Too  "—Charles  Dickens— Along  the  Ohio 
and  Down  the  Mississippi— Tiie  Carved  Oxen  at  Nauvoo — Joseph 
Smith  and  the  Mormons Page  1 

CHAPTER  II 

Visit  to  Dubuque  and  the  Wisconsin  Prairies  — A  Steamboat  Trip 
through  the  Great  Lakes  with  Mr.  Van  Buren  and  J.  K.  Paulding 
— Chicago  and  Mayor  Ogden— James  Russell  Lowell  and  Maria 
White— A  Visit  to  the  "Experiment"  at  Brook  Farm— Mr.  Rip- 
ley, Mr.  Curtis,  Hawthorne,  and  Margaret  Fuller    ....     28 

CHAPTER  III 

Washington  in  the  Forties— General  Franklin  Pierce— The  Mexican 
War — John  Quincy  Adams,  Lincoln,  Calhoun,  Benton,  and  Clay 
—  A  Sight  for  Northern  " Doughfaces *'— The  7th -of -March 
Speech— Chester  Harding— Two  Stories  of  Webster— President 
Taylor's  Inauguration— State  Balls  and  Dinners— The  Society  of 
the  Capital  Half  a  Century  Ago 41 

CHAPTER  IV 

Early  Simplicity  in  Dress  and  Manners— My  Wedding-dress  and  ray 
Marriage— A  Novel  Wedding  Trip— St  Thomas  and  Santa  Cruz 
—A  Celebrated  Lawsuit  and  a  Unique  Christmas  Festival— Ha- 
vana—Rachel,  the  Famous  French  Actress,  Visited  the  United 
States  in  1854— Fanny  Kemble— Thackeray's  Visit  to  America— 
The  Purchase  and  Restoration  of  Mount  Vernon 58 


Viii  CONTENTS 


CHAPTER  V 

The  Visit  of  the  Prince  of  Wales— The  Ball  at  the  Academy  of  Music 
— The  First  Days  of  the  War — The  Sanitary  Commission — The 
Metropolitan  Fair— Washington  in  1863 — General  McClellan  and 
the  French  Princes— A  Bail  at  the  White  House  and  Picnics  in 
Camp Page  85 

CHAPTER  VI 

Some  Memories  of  Distinguished  People— The  New  England  Literati 
—Mrs.  Sigourney  and  Miss  Sedgwick — Dr.  Bellows  and  theTran- 
scendentalists — Mr.  Bryant's  Dinners — Recollections  of  Booth — 
The  lago  Dress — Chief -Justice  Chase — Sherman  and  Grant — Ade- 
laide Ristori 96 

CHAPTER  Vn 

A  Glimpse  at  Literary  Boston  —  Prescott,  Emerson,  and  Agassiz  — 
Darley's  Picture  of  Washington  Irving  and  His  Friends— The 
Knickerhoclcer  Magazine — Mrs.  Botta's  Salon — Reminiscences  of 
Bancroft  and  Bryant— A  Birthday  at  the  Century  Club— Long- 
fellow   117 

CHAPTER  VIII  . 

My  First  Visit  to  England— Chester  Cathedral— Sunshine  in  London- 
Westminster  Abbey  and  the  British  Museum— English  Art— At 
the  English  Dinner-table — Our  American  Hospitality  an  Inher- 
ited Virtue —  Oxford,  Kenilworth,  and  Stratford-on-Avon  —  The 
English  Attitude  towards  America 133 

CHAPTER  IX 

The  Social  Side  of  London— Sir  William  Stirling-Maxwell  and  Sir 
John  Bowring— Mr.  Motley  and  General  Adam  Badeau— A  Visit 
to  Hampton  Court— Racial  Characteristics  and  Differentiation — 
The  Lord  Byron  Scandal  Again— A  Page  of  Unwritten  History— 
Across  the  Channel  to  Paris 147 

CHAPTER  X 

A  Little  Journey  in  the  Laud  of  William  Tell — Basle  and  Lucerne — 
On  the  Way  to  Interlaken — The  Jungfrau  and  the  Giesbach — 


CONTENTS  IX 

Byron  and  Voltaire— Geneva  and  Mont  Blanc— An  Ascent  of  the 
Brevent  —  Over  the  Simplon  Road  and  through  the  Gorge  of 
Gondo— On  the  Italian  Slope Page  157 

CHAPTER  XI 

The  New  York  of  Twenty  Years  Ago  —  Social  and  Geographical 
Changes  —  Grace  Church  and  "  Old  Brown"  — Three  of  New 
York's  Distinguished  Hostesses— Mrs.  Roberts's  Dinner  to  Presi- 
dent and  Mrs.  Hayes — Mr.  Evarts  and  his  Donkey  Story — Trav- 
ers  and  Jerome — Bret  Harte — George  Boker  and  Calvert — Our 

School  for  Scandal 177 

«- 

CHAPTER  XII 

Second  Visit  to  London — A  Day  in  the  House  of  Commons — London 
in  1885 — The  Ascot  Races  and  Dr.  Holmes— My  Presentation  at 
Court  and  a  State  Ball  at  Buckingham  Palace — A  Supper  with 
Irving  at  the  Beefsteak  Club  —  Mr.  Gladstone  and  the  Chapel 
Royal  —  A  Dinner  with  Sir  John  Millais  —  Mr,  Browning,  Sir 
Frederic  Leigh  ton,  Mrs.  Procter,  and  Du  Maurier  ....     201 

CHAPTER  XIII 

My  Continental  Note-book — The  Praise  of  Paris — Meissonier  and  Pol- 
itics— The  Salon  of  1886— "Varnishing  Day" — Sara  Bernhardt's 
"  Theodora  "—Nice  and  Monte  Carlo — La  Duchesse  de  Pomar, 
Lady  Caithness — A  Sad  Loss  to  the  American  Colony    .     .     222 

CHAPTER  XIV 

Imperial  Rome — The  American  Colony — W.  "W.  Story,  Bishop  Whip- 
ple, and  the  Terrys — My  Presentation  at  the  Italian  Court — A 
Ball  at  the  Quirinal — Lord  Houghton — Two  Valentines — Modern 
Rome — The  Vatican  Library  and  Gardens 239 

CHAPTER  XV 

The  Queen's  Jubilee  —  London  in  Gala  Dress  —  The  Queen's  Garden 
Party — A  Dash  into  Holland  and  the  Low  Countries — Dikes  and 
Ditches — Picture-galleries  and  Windmills — Rotterdam  and  Am- 
sterdam—  The  Zuyder  Zee  and  a  Day  at  Marken  —  Forgotten 
Bruges  and  Prosperous  Ghent— Antwerp  and  The  Hague — Ostend 
the  Frivolous     . 265 


X  CONTENTS 

CHAPTER  XVI 

la  Praise  of  Aix-les-Bains  —  Its  Cures  and  Its  Amusements — Rous- 
seau's House — La  Grande  Chartreuse  and  Its  Famous  Liqueur — 
An  Exercise  in  Russian  Linguistics — The  Marriage  of  the  Due 
d'Aosta — A  Mediaeval  F^te — The  Queen  of  Italy  and  Her  Royal 
Graces — The  House  of  Savoy  and  Its  Early  Home  at  Aix — English 
Visitors — Princess  Beatrice's  Birthday Page  291 

CHAPTER  XVII 

Letters  from  Spain — Barcelona  and  Tarragona — Roman,  Carthaginian, 
and  Moorish  Antiquities — The  Land  of  Don  Quixote — Cordova 
and  Its  Mosque — Granada  and  the  Alhambra — Fair  Seville — The 
Doukey  in  Spain 319 

CHAPTER  XVIII 

Letters  from  Spain  to  Friends  at  Home — Further  Thoughts  of  Madrid 
—•At  the  Bull-fight— Toledo,  the  Majestic  Crown  of  Spain— The 
Cathedral  and  Its  Memories — Moorish  Houses  and  Toledo  Blades 
— The  Escorial — The  Library — The  Pantheon — Burgos  and  Fare- 
well to  Spain     338 

CHAPTER  XIX 

An  Imaginary  Conversation  with  an  Editor— The  Effect  of  Fashion  on 
our  Social  Life — Our  American  Society  and  Its  Leaders — Snobs 
and  Snobbery — Society  and  Its  Mission  in  Our  National  Life — 
King  Fashion  and  His  Power— A  Last  Word 363 


AN   EPISTLE   TO   POSTERITY 


AN   EPISTLE   TO   POSTERITY 


CHAPTER  \ 


Early  Days  in  New  Hampshire — My  Father  and  Mother — Mr.  Emer- 
son's School  at  Boston — Daniel  Webster  at  Marshfield — Visit  to 
Washington— "Tyler  Too"— Charles  Dickens— Along  the  Ohio 
and  Down  the  Mississippi— The  Carved  Oxen  at  Nauvoo — Joseph 
Smith  and  the  Mormons. 

My  recollections  of  childhood  are  very  vivid,  espe- 
cially of  my  father,  a  tall  and  most  picturesque  man, 
with  blue  eyes  and  fine  curling  black  hair,  with  a  great 
laughing  mouth  full  of  white  teeth  and  of  eloquent 
voice,  and  a  laugh  which  filled  the  whole  county  of 
Cheshire;  a  man.  who  liked  to  dance  and  to  march, 
who  never  heard  music  but  to  keep  step  to  it ;  a  man, 
in  fact,  who  had  the  veriest  charm  for  children — a  tre- 
mendous vitality. 

In  those  days  my  father,  still  a  boy  himself,  and  a 
very  boyish  boy,  was  the  best  hand  of  us  all  at  snow- 
balling in  the  winter,  teaching  us  to  slide  and  to  skate, 
and  reading  aloud  to  us  in  the  evening  the  immortal 
stories  of  Walter  Scott,  with  a  mingled  joy  and  pathos 
which  the  author  himself  would  have  enjo3^ed  ;  a  kind 
and  loving  and  generous  man,  full  of  genius  and  eccen- 
tricity, who  dressed  in  furs  and  moccasins  in  January, 
when  he  would  go  up  to  the  White  Mountains  to  hunt 
1 


:%'.  ,     .   ,   .     ,     AH   EPISTLE   TO    POSTERITY 

.tlieuioose.witli  Anans,  an  Indian  of  the  St.  Francois 
•  fpiBej,  who  hnA  .'oeen. educated  at  Hanover,  at  Dartmouth 
College — that  venerable  institution  founded  by  an  Eng- 
lish Earl  for  the  education  of  the  Indians,  which,  accord- 
ing to  Anans,  "  spoiled  a  great  many  good  Indians  and 
made  very  poor  white  men." 

Years  after,  in  Eome,  I  met  the  Earl's  great-grand- 
daughter. Lady  Louisa  Legge,  and  as  she  asked  me  with 
great  naivete  about  this  bequest  I  had  to  tell  her  it  had 
been  relegated  to  the  humble  prosaic  education  of  white 
boys. 

But  perhaps  it  had  made  Anans  a  better  companion 
for  my  father,  who  had  a  real  friendship  for  this  son 
of  the  forest.  I  remember  the  camp  in  the  wilderness, 
Anans  and  his  Indian  wife  and  their  pappoose  swung  in 
a  birch-bark  cradle  under  a  spreading  tree,  and  a  little 
pair  of  moccasins  which  Mrs.  Anans  wrought  with  beads 
for  my  little  feet  when  as  a  child  I  was  taken  to  the 
White  Mountains.  Perhaps  to  that  I  owe  my  love  of 
wandering,  for  I  have  never  been  able  to  keep  them 
still  since. 

My  father  must  have  been  a  very  good  housekeeper, 
for  I  remember  always  a  most  hospitable  table,  and  a 
larder  full  of  succulent  delicacies — venison  and  moose 
tongue,  wild  turkey  and  quail  (shot  with  his  own  un- 
erring gun),  besides  all  the  excellent  provision  of  the 
domestic  farm-yard,  and  the  yearly  pig-killing,  which 
frightful,  bloody  scene  I  used  to  peep  at  surreptitiously 
from  my  nursery  window.  A  fine  series  of  cellars  un- 
derlined our  large  house,  dark,  wandering,  limitless,  like 
the  mysteries  of  Udolpho,  and  filled  with  binns,  where 
vegetables  kept  all  winter  without  freezing,  together 
with  the  hams  of  the  late  slaughtered  pig,  and  his  be- 
quest of  wreaths  of  sausages.    A  great  barrel  of  Ma- 


MY   FATHER   AND   MOTHER  3 

deira  from  John  and  Charles  March,  New  York,  was 
rolled  in  every  fall,  and  my  father  and  ray  uncle  Kob- 
ert,  another  son  of  Anak  (for  they  were  both  six  feet 
four),  used  to  attend  to  the  bottling  of  this,  then  daily 
used,  fine  wine.  I  never  drank  any  of  it,  but  I  have 
the  ichor  of  it  in  my  veins  to-day,  innocent  as  I  am, 
in  the  shape  of  rheumatism.  "My  grandfather  left 
me  the  gout,  without  any  cellar  of  wine  to  keep  it 
up  on,"  said  James  Kussell  Lowell,  and  I  might  say  the 
same.  My  father  was  lawyer,  ^politician,  and  military 
man.  I  never  heard  him  addressed  by  any  lesser  title 
than  Captain,  and  he  was  a  captain  of  thousands  for 
fifty  years ;  after  that  he  was  called  General,  as  his  fa- 
ther was  called  the  "old  Squire"  all  his  life,  a  tribute 
to  the  customs  of  the  Old  World  which  I  have  always 
remembered  with  pleasure. 

James  Wilson,  my  grandfather,  I  remember  as  a  hand- 
some and  distinguished  figure.  He  was  exceedingly 
fond  of  dress,  and  never  walked  up  the  street  but  in  a 
full-dress  suit,  with  a  rufiled  shirt  and  white  cravat.  In 
the  rufiie  was  placed  a  topaz  pin  surrounded  by  pearls. 
In  his  ^ne,  well-kept  hand  was  a  gold-headed  cane,  and 
his  feet  were  in  polished  shoes ;  he  looked  the  rich  and 
respected  citizen. 

"There  goes  the  old  Squire,  as  vain  as  a  peacock," 
I  overheard  a  workmg-man  say  one  day.  But  I  was 
very  much  afraid  of  this  vision  of  old-time  elegance,  for 
he  did  not  like  to  see  me  romping  along  the  street, 
and  once  addressed  me  in  this  terrible  manner :  "  Mary 
Elizabeth,  I  am  very  sorry  to  see  a  pupil  of  Miss  Fiske's 
school,  and  my  granddaughter,  dancing  on  the  public 
highway."  I  did  stop  dancing  until  after  his  dear  back 
was  turned,  but  hypocrisy  is  the  tribute  which  vice  pays 
to  virtue.     I  kept  on  dancing  for  many  years,  street 


4  AN   EPISTLE   TO   POSTERITY 

or  no  street,  but  I  took  good  care  not  to  let  him  see 
me. 

This  splendid  old  person  had  been  a  classmate  of  John 
Quincy  Adams  at  Harvard,  and  Mr.  Adams  told  me  af- 
terwards that  he  remembered  my  grandfather  as  "  the 
best-dressed  man  in  college."  "  He  used  to  wear  a  scarlet 
coat  and  knee  -  breeches,  and  was  the  strongest  and  best 
wrestler  in  college,"  says  my  authority.  I  imagine  this 
coat  had  cost  his  mother  many  a  hard  bout  of  spinning 
and  weaving,  for  this  brave  woman  went  to  Boston  twice 
a  year  on  horseback  with  the  products  of  her  loom,  that 
she  might  educate  her  oldest  son,  and  proudly  she  dressed 
him  well. 

She  and  her  husband,  Robert  "Wilson,  had  come  over 
from  Ireland  together,  as  children,  in  that  first  great 
emigration  of  the  Scotch-Irish  to  America  —  those  un- 
dismayed Presbyterians,  who  brought  such  noble  gifts 
with  them,  and  who  became  such  important  settlers 
for  the  new  colonies.  Robert  Wilson,  a  relative  of 
General  Stark,  fought  in  the  Revolutionary  war,  and 
settled  down,  an  impoverished  man,  in  Peterboro,  N.  H. ; 
but  his  brave  wife,  full  of  good  blood,  kept  up  the 
traditions  of  her  English  and  Scotch  ancestry.  The 
eldest  son  must  be  educated — indeed,  she  educated  two 
sons  at  Harvard,  a  feat  of  extraordinary  valor  in  those 
days. 

Both  lived  to  honor  her,  and  she  lived  to  see  them 
both  in  Congress,  a  fact  which  delighted  her  much.  Her 
son  James,  my  grandfather,  saw  the  Capitol  burned  by 
the  British.  My  father  was  a  veritable  Irishman,  more 
Irish  than  Scotch,  and  he  always  reminded  me,  after  I 
grew  older,  of  the  sketches  of  Grattan.  His  eloquence, 
which  was  marvellous,  could  make  even  a  'New  Hamp- 
shire jury  laugh  and  cry,  and  he  became  the  leading 


MY   FATHER  5 

advocate  of  his  State.  He  was  impulsive  and  lavish, 
imprudent  and  alwaj^s  in  hot  water,  although,  like  the 
clever  Bishop  Wilberforce,  "  he  always  came  out  cleaner 
than  he  went  in."  He  was  philanthropic,  and  wise  (for 
other  people).  New  Hampshire  enjoys  to-day,  in  her 
fine  roads,  the  result  of  his  wise  forecast,  for  he  helped 
to  legislate  for  them,  and  her  blind  and  lunatic  asylums 
owe  much  to  his  great  heart  and  brilliant  brain.  He 
was  a  lovely,  dear,  big  playmate  to  his  little  children. 
We  kept  on  admiring  him  until  we  were  no  longer 
little;  but  I  can  never  forget  that  sense  of  protec- 
tion and  security  with  which  I  crept  into  those  huge 
arms,  or  the  love  and  warmth  of  that  grand,  magnifi- 
cent embrace,  when  I  was  cold,  unhappy,  or  misunder- 
stood. 

He  was  amusing  too,  with  his  guns  and  game,  the 
prodigious  glory  of  his  military  uniforms,  blue  with  gold 
facings,  and  a  long  yellow  plume  in  his  chajpeau  hras, 
which  I  found  delightfully  picturesque.  He  was  a 
Mason  as  well,  and  I  often  wickedly  opened  a  secret 
drawer  in  his  closet  where  I  saw  strange  jewels  and 
insignia  which  it  was  not  expected  that  I  should  behold. 
On  all  occasions  when  a  speech  was  permissible  he  made 
one,  and  his  voice  was  superb;  he  could  be  heard 
"  across  the  Atlantic,"  and  later  on,  when  he  vowed  to 
elect  the  first  General  Harrison,  in  1840,  "  Tippecanoe 
and  Tyler  too,"  I  often  heard  him  address  five  thousand 
people,  all  hanging  on  his  every  word.  Mr.  Webster 
called  him  the  "  first  of  the  stump  speakers,"  and  the 
Hon.  Henry  Wilson,  born  a  Colbaith,  told  me  that  he 
changed  his  name  to  Wilson  from  admiration  of  my 
father's  eloquence. 

He  was  a  strange,  romantic  outcrop  of  Irish  blood 
and  Puritan  surroundings,  singularly  unlike  his  prudent, 


6  AN    EPISTLE   TO    POSTERITY 

reserved  father.  As  a  man  of  genius  is  unlike  his  race 
and  is  often  misunderstood,  my  father  was  misunder- 
stood, and  I  fear  he  became  unhappy  and  disappointed. 
His  political  idol  was  Mr.  Webster,  and  when  Mr.  Web- 
ster made  the  7th-of-March  speech  ray  father's  political 
heart  broke. 

A  good  patriot  and  a  fine,  unselfish  character,  always 
ready  to  work  for  any  good  cause.  General  James  Wil- 
son lived  to  be  eighty-four  years  old,  and  died  in  the 
house  where  he  had  made  us  all  so  happy.  The  State 
offered  him  a  public  funeral,  for  who  had  served  it  so 
well?  The  town  of  Keene,  where  he  was  loved  and 
honored,  suspended  business,  as  the  soldiers  of  his  own 
"  Keene  Light  Infantry  "  escorted  him  to  his  last  home. 
It  was  a  beautiful  day  in  May,  and  Monadnock,  his 
neighboring  giant,  looked  down  upon  him  in  a  full-dress 
uniform  of  blue  and  gold.  The  children  of  the  public 
schools  stood  in  line  as  he  was  carried  along.  In  the 
church  his  much-loved  pastor  said :  "  To  whom  are  these 
great  honors  paid  ?  To  the  silver-tongued  orator,  to  the 
soldier,  to  the  learned  lawyer,  to  the  politician  f  No,  to 
the  man  of  heart f^  and  that  he  was. 

As  I  looked  my  last  on  his  peaceful  face  I  noticed  that 
his  black  curls  were  scarcely  streaked  with  gray.  They 
lay  in  still  infantile  luxuriance  as  he  had  always  worn 
them  around  his  massive  brow.  The  strange  contradic- 
tion, which  had  pervaded  his  nature — the  child  and  the 
giant  —  it  was  all  there  —  noble,  lovable,  and  youthful 
to  the  last. 

My  mother,  a  beautiful  and  quiet  person,  was  the 
antipodes  of  her  husband.  Hers  was  a  soul  made  for 
renunciation,  and  the  Puritan  element  was  strong  in  her. 
She  never  allowed  herself  to  lavish  caresses  upon  her 
children,  but  she  was  their  faithful  friend  in  illness,  and 


MY   MOTHER  7 

always  stood  ready — the  very  genius  of  hospitality — to 
feed  the  hungry  and  to  clothe  the  poor.  When  I  reflect 
on  all  that  a  housewife  had  to  meet  in  cold  ISTew  Hamp- 
shire winters,  with  the  thermometer  at  28°  below  zero 
and  no  furnace,  I  can  but  wonder  at  and  admire  her  pluck 
and  her  ingenuity,  for  her  parlor  windows  were  full  of 
hot-house  plants  all  winter ;  and  I  think  I  never  went  to 
a  party  for  thirty  years  in  after-life  that  I  did  not  seem 
to  breathe  the  scent  of  the  little  bouquet  w^hich  she 
always  had  ready  for  me  in  those  early  days — a  white 
rose,  a  sprig  of  geranium,  and  a  clove  pink,  with  some 
sweet-scented  verbena.  I  can  see  her  almost  statuesque 
dignity  still,  and  the  rich,  red  lips,  which  rarely  parted 
in  a  smile ;  but  when  they  did,  what  a  perfect  set  of 
teeth !  A  slice  of  fresh  cocoanut  was  not  more  deli- 
ciously  white  and  fresh,  and  her  complexion  of  lilies 
and  roses  remained  with  her  to  the  last.  How  could 
such  wonderful  beauty  have  survived  that  cold  climate  ? 
Years  after,  at  Washington,  these  charms  of  hers  excited 
national  admiration.  She  received  it  with  the  calmness 
of  the  mother  of  the  Gracchi ;  indeed,  she  was  a  study 
after  the  antique. 

Perhaps  the  early  death  of  her  boys  —  victims  to 
those  cruel  winters,  victims  of  croup  and  scarlet-fever — 
had  saddened  her ;  but  I  do  not  remember  my  mother  as 
enjoying  her  beauty  or  as  ever  seeming  frivolous  or  vain. 
She  was  apt  to  be  well  dressed — that  seemed  to  crop  out 
of  her  inner  consciousness — and  she  had  "  love,  honor, 
obedience,  troops  of  friends  ";  but  she  died  at  fifty,  look- 
ing only  twenty,  and  I  often  wish  that  I  could  go  back 
and  make  her  smile  that  too  rare  smile,  too  often  in- 
terrupted by  tears. 

Her  large,  populous,  and  busy  household  was  presided 
over  below-stairs  by  Roxana,  the  last  of  a  noble  race — 


8  AN   EPISTLE  TO   POSTERITY 

an  American  servant,  the  best  cook  that  ever  suggested 
the  Physiologie  du  Gout.  When  I  forget,  O  Roxana !  thy 
clear  soups,  light  bread,  and  delicate  desserts,  thy  coffee, 
better  than  any  I  have  drunk  in  Paris ;  when  I  am  un- 
grateful for  thy  broiled  birds  and  thy  superb  treatment 
of  venison — 

"  The  haunch  was  a  picture  for  painters  to  study ; 
The  fat  was  so  white  and  the  lean  was  so  ruddy"— 

when  I  forget  thy  cookery,  O  Eoxana  1  may  I  be  con- 
demned to  eat  sawdust  all  my  days ! 

From  the  amount  of  sawdust  and  bad  cookery  which 
I  have  eaten  I  might  consider  myself  punished  for  in- 
gratitude; but  no!  there  was  never  such  a  cook  as 
Roxana ! 

The  physical  conditions  of  my  bringing-up  were  emi- 
nently healthy.  The  good  and  plentiful  table,  the  splen- 
did, exhilarating  air,  the  exercise  on  horseback,  the  line 
sleigh-rides  in  an  immense  gilded  structure  called  "  The 
Sleigh,"  which  my  father  had  had  built  for  his  own  long 
limbs,  and  to  accommodate  a  large  family  and  all  the 
neighbors — a  sleigh  which  reminded  one  of  St.  Petersburg 
— the  fascinating  summers  and  autumns,  with  the  picnics 
and  the  walks  and  excursions  in  that  prettiest  and  most 
finished  valley  which  surrounds  Keene  (worthy  of  its 
English-named  county,  Cheshire) ;  with  Monadnock,  a 
stone  mountain,  shaped  like  Vesuvius,  w^hich  IsTature 
dropped  from  her  apron  as  she  was  going  up  to  make 
the  White  Mountains ;  those  pine  woods,  as  ample  as 
the  Pineta  of  Ravenna ;  the  soft  hills  wooded  to  the 
top;  the  wide,  fertile,  and  picturesque  meadows;  the 
slow  and  sluggish  current  of  the  Ashuelot,  winding 
among  the  drooping  willows  and  stately  elms — afforded 
days  for  the  pleasures  of  budding  girlhood  which  were 


EAELY   BEADING  9 

unrivalled.  Then  Keene  was  an  agreeable,  sociable 
place,  full  of  scholarly  men  and  handsome  matrons,  who 
had  homes  to  which  any  one  would  like  to  be  invited. 
We  had  parties  and  balls,  and  occasionally  a  military 
ball,  and  I  never  imagined  that  there  was  such  a  thing 
as  ennui.  We  read  prodigiously,  and  that  atmosphere 
of  culture  for  which  Boston  has  been  so  much,  perhaps, 
laughed  at  penetrated  to  our  very  midst.  We  were 
intimate  with  the  Sage  of  Weimar  and  with  Thomas 
Carlyle.  Emerson  came  up  to  lecture  to  us,  and  we 
welcomed  the  first  little  green  books  which  emanated 
from  Boz  and  the  yellow-colored  Thackeray s.  The  first 
yellow  cover  I  ever  saw  held  Becky  Sharp  in  its  em- 
brace. It  was  the  purest  and  best  society  I  have  seen. 
No  unclean  thing  came  near  it.  But — alas  that  there 
is  always  a  but! — my  mother's  clear  blue  eyes,  sharp 
as  a  Damascus  blade,  cut  through  the  dignified  preten- 
sions of  Miss  F 's  school.     She  found  out  that  I  was 

individually  learning  nothing,  and  I  was  surprised  one 
night  reading  Miss  Edgeworth's  Helen  at  the  hour  of 
two  in  the  morning. 

I  have  always  illogically  wished  that  Miss  Edge- 
worth,  now  sunk  into  undeserved  oblivion,  could  have 
lived  to  hear  that  anybody  sat  up  all  night  to  read 
her  decorous  Helen.  What  fin-de-siecle  girl  will  do  it 
now? 

But  I  hurt  nothing  but  my  e3''es  in  this  nocturnal  im- 
propriety. The  one  candle  was  blown  out,  and  I  was 
rebuked.  My  mother  told  me  that  Mrs.  Brown  and 
Mrs.  Selden  had  called  on  her  the  day  before  to  say 
that  they  feared  Mary  Elizabeth  was  reading  too 
many  novels;  that  Mr.  Tilden,  the  head  of  the  circu- 
lating library,  said  that  the  same  offending  M.  E.  took 
out  two  novels  every  week,  while  Lucretia  Brown  took 


10  AN   EPISTLE   TO   POSTERITY 

out  Mrs.  Cliaporee's  Letters  and  The  Serious  Call ;  and 
Mrs.  Selden  said  she  thought  it  very  bad  for  a  girl's 
future  to  be  reading  novels  all  the  time.  Alas  !  when 
I  was  put  through  a  severe  examination  I  stood  A  ]^o.  1 
in  Scott,  Bulwer,  Edgeworth,  and  Miss  Austen,  but  I 
did  not  know  much  geography  nor  the  least  arithmetic, 
so  I  was  marched  into  my  father's  office,  where  he  was 
at  work  upon  a  complicated  law  -  case.  My  mother,  as 
beautiful  and  quite  as  severe  as  Dante's  avenging  angel, 
stood  pale  and  terrible,  addressing  the  busy  man  (wlio 
found  it  quite  inconvenient  to  receive  us  at  that  time) 
with  these  words,  which  are  burned  into  my  heart: 
"Colonel  Wilson,  here  is  our  daughter,  whom  we  have  sent 
to  Miss  Fiske's  school,  and  of  whose  abilities  and  studi- 
ous habits  we  had  hoped  so  much.  She  was  reading  a 
novel  at  two  o'clock  last  night,  and  she  cannot  parse  a 
word  of  Paradise  Lost.  She  cannot  bound  Pennsyl- 
vania, she  does  not  know  where  Jerusalem  is,  and  she 
thinks  six  times  six  may  be  forty." 

My  father's  sense  of  humor  was  so  strong  that  he 
burst  into  a  fit  of  laughter  which  shook  the  house, 
and  I  burst  into  tears.  He  took  me  to  that  ample 
breast  of  his,  and  said,  "IS'ever  mind,  we  will  send 
you  to  Boston  to  school.  Don't  cry.  Don't  read  so 
many  novels,  and  obey  your  mother.  But  how  does 
it  happen  that  you  do  not  know  the  multiplication- 
table?" 

"  Father,  I  hate  it,  I  hate  it,  I  hate  it ! — so  I  write 
Matilda  Slocum's  compositions,  and  she  does  my  sums." 

"  Well,"  said  he,  "  you  have  been  cheating  yourself 
most  bravely.  Let  Matilda's  compositions  alone,  and  do 
you  tell  me  the  'nines  and  sixes'  to-morrow  night  at 
dinner." 

So  a  very  delightful  dinner  of  turkey  was  spoiled  for 


11 

me  the  next  day  at  four  o'clock,  and  I  was  put  on  a 
short  commons  of  novels.  Bulwer  was  entirely  forbid- 
den, and  I  read  Napoleon  at  St.  Helena.  I  was  allowed 
Walter  Scott  (God  bless  him !)  and  Miss  Austen.  God 
bless  her  a  thousand  times!  She  lighted  the  weary 
way  of  a  poor  little  girl  for  a  very  dreary  winter. 

I  think  the  Eeverend  Mr.  Livermore  came  in  about  this 
time  to  teach  me  a  little  German,  to  soften  the  asperi- 
ties of  Mrs.  Selden  and  Mrs.  Brown,  and  even  to  give 
me  a  lift  up  the  ladder  of  literature,  for  he  accepted 
my  first  story,  sent  anonymously  to  the  Social  Gazette, 
a  periodical  read  in  his  dear  clerical  parlor,  where  I 
first  experienced  the  exhilarating  thrill  of  hearing  my 
own  writings  read  to  an  appreciative  circle.  Mr.  Pren- 
tiss said,  "  That  is  a  capital  story."  I,  the  unknown 
author,  sat  burning  in  the  background.  My  mother 
(O  rapture!)  applauded  it.  Dear  woman,  it  was  the 
only  time ! 

When  I  got  home  I  told  her /  had  written  it.  "Go 
to  bed,  my  dear ;  it  was  a  very  jpoor  story  indeed^''  said 
she,  sternly. 

My  mother  thought  flattery  of  any  kind  was  wicked, 
and  so  had  the  early  teaching  of  her  Puritan,  Calvinis- 
tic  parents  steeled  her  tender  heart  that  she  allowed 
my  youth  to  pass  without  a  caress  and  without  praise. 
The  word  love  was  never  mentioned.  I  wonder  we 
did  not  all  grow  up  Shakeresses.  In  fact,  the  fault  of 
all  New  England  education  was  a  certain  hardness. 
Our  minds  were  cultivated  more  than  our  hearts. 

There  was  a  blue  lookout  for  my  dreamy  shirking  of 
the  boundaries  of  Pennsylvania.  Never,  however,  did  so 
slight  a  fault  lead  to  so  useful  a  punishment.  To  go  to 
Mr.  Emerson's  school,  to  be  a  "  Boston  girl " — even  in 
name — was  a  vision  of  majesty.    I  determined  that  I 


12  AN    EPISTLE    TO   POSTEKITY 

would  learn  how  to  study,  and  after  a  fashion  I  did. 
Female  education  was  at  a  very  low  ebb  in  what  were 
called  ''  Ladies'  Schools  "  in  those  days.  We  learned  to 
be  ladies,  I  hope,  for  we  certainly  learned  very  little 
else.  Had  it  not  been  for  cultivated  people  about  me — 
had  it  not  been  for  my  dear  Keverend  Mr.  Livermore,  I 
should  have  had  most  arid  oases  in  my  youthful  mind. 
My  parents  were  both  too  busy  to  criticise  me ;  there 
were  younger  children,  always  having  the  croup  and 
the  scarlet-fever.  I  often  sat  up  all  night,  not  reading 
Miss  Edgeworth,  but  holding  in  my  arms  a  poor  little 
struggling  brother.  Alas!  I  saw  three  of  them  die, 
and  how  deeply  did  I  sympathize  with  my  poor  moth- 
er !  Perhaps  this  ploughshare  of  agony  which  went 
through  my  girlish  heart  kept  me  from  being  cold,  in- 
different, merciless,  thoughtless.  I  hope  so,  but  I  still 
believe  praises  and  smiles  and  a  little  approbation  would 
have  made  of  me  a  more  amiable  character. 

My  father  and  mother  had  followed  that  wave  of 
Unitarianism  which  was  started  by  Channing  and  Mar- 
tineau,  and  all  my  ideas  of  religion  were  hopeful,  inspir- 
ing, and  beautiful.  I  never  knew  that  horror  of  "  a  jeal- 
ous God,"  which  doctrine  had  been  assiduously  preached 
in  New  England  just  before  I  came  on  the  scene,  and 
which  had  gone  far  to  fill  the  insane  asylums.  Indeed, 
one  of  my  own  schoolmates  had  gone  raving  in  a  relig- 
ious mania  under  my  own  eyes.  But  I  can  remember  the 
soothing  words  of  Mr.  Livermore,  who  came  in  as  I  was 
holding  one  little  dear,  dying  brother  in  my  arms  — 
how  he  took  him  from  me  and  said,  with  such  hopeful, 
peaceful  assurance,  that  "  death  was  swallowed  up  in 
victor3^"  I  never  had  a  doubt.  My  God  has  always 
been  a  loving  God. 

I  wish  I  could  repay  here  my  indebtness  to  that  ad- 


EARLY   RELIGIOUS   INFLUENCES  13 

mirable,  loving  man,  Abbot  Livermore.  He  belonged  to 
that  ministerial  family  whom  Dr.  Bellows  called  "  the 
Abbots  with  one  V 

Would  that  any  convent  had  enjoyed  such  an  abbot! 
Keene,  under  that  Christ-like  influence,  and  that  of  his 
follower,  the  Rev.  William  O.  White,  was  a  community 
to  be  envied.  Spirituahsm,  Second- Ad ventism,  and  Mor- 
monism  devastated  our  neighboring  towns,  but  no  such 
delusions  troubled  the  peace  of  those  congregations  com- 
mitted to  their  charge — these  enlightened  men ;  and  they 
brought  to  us  that  wonderful  body  of  thinkers,Waterston, 
Dr.  Lowell,  Dr.  Parkman,  James  Freeman  Clarke,  Rev. 
C.  A.  Bartol,  the  saintly  W.  B.  O.  Peabody  of  Spring- 
field, Dr.  Gannett,  Dr.  Bellows  (destined  to  be  one  of  the 
best  friends  of  my  later  life);  later  on,  Edward  Everett 
Hale,  several  Channings,  and  Dr.  Lothrop,  the  polished 
Wilberforce  of  the  Unitarian  Church.  These  men  were 
scholars  and  elegant  men  of  the  world.  Dr.  Hunting- 
ton, now  Bishop  of  Central  New  York,  was  one  of  them, 
and,  like  him,  man}^  of  the  Unitarians  of  that  day  be- 
came Episcopalians  of  this  day.  It  was  perhaps  a  halt- 
ing-place for  the  soul,  freed  from  the  terrible  chains  of 
Calvinism,  upward  and  on  to  a  more  "  reasonable  faith." 
It  needed,  perhaps,  for  its  ultimate  development,  the  lib- 
eral creed  and  the  wonderful  prayer-book  of  the  Epis- 
copal Church. 

Some  letters  written  about  this  time  have  turned  up 
in  an  old  desk  and  have  helped  my  recollections.  As 
they  may  amuse  the  reader,  I  print  them,  mistakes  and 
all: 

"Boston,  Nov.  184 — . 
"Dear  Mother, — I  am  finding  my  place  in  Mr.  Emerson's  school. 
I  thought  I  never  should,  and  I  cried  three  nights  pretty  hard.     He 
made  me  lake  up  the  Latin  grammar  and  learn  it  all  by  heart  from  be- 


14  AN   EPISTLE   TO   POSTERITY 

ginning  to  end.  I  recite  sometimes  to  his  daughter,  Lucy  Emerson, 
a  very  pretty  girl,  with  the  briglitest  eyes  and  little  dancing  black 
curls,  but  the  sharpest  thing  you  ever  saw.  She  won't  let  me  make 
a  mistake,  her  eyes  go  right  through  me.  I  told  Mr.  Emerson  1  would 
rather  recite  to  him  or  to  Miss  Monroe.  He  laughed  and  said  he  was 
glad  Lucy  was  so  correct.  I  think  he  and  she  mean  to  be  kind — but 
oh !  duty  and  pleasure  have  to  be  kept  seperate.     I  miss  home  and 

Keene  very  much,  but  Mrs.  P is  very  kind  and  gives  me  rather 

too  good  a  breakfast.  I  have  to  walk  up  a  steep  hill,  and  then  go  up 
four  flights  of  stairs,  and  I  suffer  a  pain  in  my  chest  after  all  that.  I 
trust  your  tic  doloureaux  is  better. 

"Ever  your  loving 

"M.  E." 


{From  my  mother  to  me.) 
"Dear  Maey  Elizabeth,  —  Seperate  is  not  correct.  Separate 
would  be  nearer  right.  Are  you  not  to  study  the  English  branches 
at  Mr.  Emerson's  school  ?  I  am  sure  I  knew,  how  to  spell  Separate  at 
your  age.  Now,  my  dear  child,  exercise  all  your  talents  and  all  your 
principles.  This  is  your  first  absence  from  home.  Try  to  lay  the 
foundations  of  a  useful  character.  Remember,  life  is  not  all  play.  I 
miss  your  sympathy,  and  sometimes  think  I  have  thrown  my  own  sor- 
rows and  cares  on  you  too  early.  We  are  already  counting  the  days 
until  you  come  home  at  Christmas. 

"Your  mother, 

"M.  L.  W." 


"Boston,  Nov.  6. 
"Dear  Mother,  —  I  have  bought  my  winter  suit.  It  is  of  blue 
merino,  with  a  spot  of  browm  in  it,  like  an  autumn  leaf,  and  a  lovely  blue 
silk  cloak  lined  with  a  brown  satin;  a  bonnet  of  blue,  with  Marabout 
feathers,  and  rosebuds— O,  just  the  sweetest  thing  you  ever  saw !  Will- 
iam says  it  is  very  becoming.  I  wore  it  all  to  Dr.  Lowell's  church  last 
Sunday,  and  I  could  not  help  thinking  of  myself,  all  the  time.  There 
is  a  great  pleasure  in  new  clothes,  isn't  there  ?  Do  you  think  we  attend 
to  dothes  quite  enough,  at  Keene  ?  Here  the  girls  talk  and  think  of 
them,  a  great  deal.  I  fear  I  have  spent  too  much  money,  nearly  one 
hundred  dollars,  since  I  left  you,  but  I  think  I  have  got  all  I  need  get, 
for  the  winter.  I  am  getting  on  pretty  well  at  Mr.  Emerson's,  although 
it  is  as  hard  as  a  galley  slave's  life.    I  wish  I  could  sit  down  and  tell 

you  all  about  C and  M and  Susan— nice  girls  all  of  them.   M.  P. 

sings  as  delightfully  as  ever,  and  is  the  belle  of  all  our  little  parties. 


SCHOOL-GIRL   LETTERS  15 

We  go  out  to  tea  often.  Father's  friends  treat  me  with  a  great  deal  of 
attention,  and  the  Lawrences  and  Mrs.  Page  have  asked  me  to  tea.  I 
am  to  see  Washington  Allston's  picture  to-morrow. 

"  Ever  your  loving 

"M.  E." 


•'Keene,  Dec. 
"  My  DARLiNa  Daughter, — I  hear  you  look  very  well  in  your  new 
blue  suit,  and  I  think  as  you  bought  it  all  yourself,  and  not  with  my 
advice,  you  shall  not  be  scolded  for  spending  so  much.  We  must 
try  to  make  it  do  for  two  winters,  but  I  am  seriously  sorry  to  hear  you 
say  you  could  not  help  thinking  of  yourself  all  church  time  !  Try  on 
that  sacred  day  to  dismiss  all  thoughte  of  yourself  and  your  clothes. 
It  is  one  reason  1  wish  you  to  be  well-dressed  so  you  shall  not  think 
of  yourself,  for  I  know  it  is  mortifying  to  a  young  person  to  be  ill- 
dressed,  but  I  trust  you  will  rise  above  clothes.  Thank  Mrs.  P.  for 
her  great  kindness  to  you,  and  do  not  eat  hot  cakes  for  breakfast. 
Dr.  Twitchell  says  that  is  the  cause  of  the  pain  in  your  chest. 
Your  little  sisters  both  have  severe  sore  throats.  Take  care  and  not 
get  one,  in  Boston.  Bathe  yourself  freely  in  cold  water,  even  if  you 
have  to  break  the  ice  in  the  pitcher. 

"  Your  Mother, 

"M.  L.  W." 


"  Boston,  Dec,  184—. 

"Dear  Mother, — I  have  been  taken  to  hear  Miss  Margaret  Fuller 
talk.  She  received  me  very  kindly.  I  found  her  a  very  plain  woman 
with  almost  a  hump  back,  but  the  moment  she  began  to  talk  I  found 
her  most  fascinating  ;  there  was  a  sort  of  continuous  long  low  stream 
of  well-constructed  sentences  and  that  Boston  pronunciation  which 
you  and  I  admire.  She  said:  'Talk  about  your  friends'  interests 
and  not  your  own ;  always  put  the  pronoun  you  for  the  pronoun  / 
when  you  can.'  (A  lady  near  me  pulled  my  skirt  and  said:  'She 
is  a  great  egotist  herself.')  'In  Society  to  have  unity  one  must 
have  units,  one  cannot  be  unanimous  alone.'  She  said:  'Never  talk 
of  your  diseases,  your  domestics  or  your  dresses.'  She  said:  '  Think 
before  you  speak,  and  never  speak  unless  you  feel  you  cannot  help 
speaking.' 

**  *  But  then  I  should  never  speak  at  all,'  said  S . 

'**  Perhaps  the  world  would  be  none  the  worse,' said  she,  rather 
cruelly,  I  thought. 

"She  is  cruel.    The  girls  all  came  away  frightened.    One  said  that 


16  AK   EPISTLE   TO    POSTERITY 

she  had  been  at  a  concert  with  her  a  few  days  before,  and  that  Mar- 
garet Fuller  turned  round  and  scolded  them  all  for  talking  during 
the  music ;  but  that  was  right,  I  think.  They  call  her  here  '  the 
great,  the  intellectual  Miss  Fuller.' 

"I  think  these  great  people  do  not  know  how  frightened  girls  are; 
they  would  not  be  so  severe.  My  teacher,  Mr.  George  B.  Emerson, 
does  not  believe  in  her.  I  told  him  about  my  visit  to  her  the  next 
morning.  He  said:  'Learn  to  tJiink,  young  lady,  and  the  talk  will 
come  of  itself.' 

"Mr.  Emerson  impresses  me  more  and  more  every  day.  I  see  tliat 
he  reads  all  our  characters,  and  that,  severe  as  he  is,  he  does  not  mean 
to  make  machines  of  us ;  he  is  a  real  chivalrous  gentleman  as  well, 
and  most  respected  in  Boston. 

"I  have  been  suffering  again  with  that  pain  in  the  chest,  on  going  up- 
stairs. O,  I  wish  there  were  no  such  things  as  stairs  or  hills  in  this 
"world  ;  but  I  am  coming  home  for  the  Christmas  holidays  next  week 
and  that  will  cure  me.     Good-night,  dear  Mother. 

"M.  E." 


"Boston,  Fd^.,  184—. 
"Dearest  Mother, — I  had  a  sad  coming  to  Boston  through  the 
snow  storm;  the  gentlemen  inside  the  stage  coach  threw  their  shawls 
around  me,  and  one  took  off  his  overshoes,  and  put  them  on  my  feet 
outside  of  my  own  thin  boots. 

"  'This  little  girl  will  freeze  to  death,' said  he. 
"  But  I  would  not  come  inside,  it  makes  me  so  deathly  sea-sick  as  you 
know.     I  have  been  very  ill,  wilh  sore  throat,  but  got  up  my  lessons 
all  the  same. 

"It  is  a  pretty  hard  ride  from  Keene  to  Nashua,  outside  the  coach 
when  it  snows. 

"  Ever  yours  with  love 

"M.  E." 

Oh  !  the  dreariness  of  those  stage-coach  rides  in  win- 
ter !  It  almost  extinguishes  the  pleasure  of  the  remem- 
brance of  how  perfect  they  were  in  summer,  under  the 
green  boughs  and  the  straggling  sunbeams.  I  think 
I  laid  the  foundations  of  a  life -long  rheumatism  in 
those  dreadful  drives  during  the  New  Hampshire  win- 
ters. 


WINTER   TRAVELLING   FIFTY   YEARS    AGO  17 

This  fragment  of  a  letter — and  there  were  many  like 
it — shows  what  we  endured  before  rapid  transit  was  ac- 
complished. I  have  seen  many  inventions,  the  electric 
telegraph,  postage-stamps,  envelopes,  chloroform,  pho- 
tographs, sewing-machines,  parlor  matches,  canning  of 
fruit  and  vegetables,  but  none  of  them  equal  the  'parlor 
car  and  the  rapidity  of  steam  travel ;  not  even  the  steam 
furnace,  which  doubtless  saves  many  a  life  *in  the  cold 
Northern  States.  "When  I  remember  that  freezing  child 
on  the  top  of  that  dreary  stage-coach  with  the  ther- 
mometer at  zero,  I  do  not  wonder  that  I  have  been  a 
rheumatic  all  my  later  life.  I  only  wonder  that  I  lived 
a  year. 

My  health  gave  way  between  these  exposures  and 
Mr.  Emerson's  stairs,  and  my  kind  father  came  home 
from  the  West  to  see  to  me  and  to  take  me  back  with 
him.  He  had  accepted  from  General  Harrison's  ad- 
ministration the  office  of  Surveyor  -  General  of  Iowa, 
then  much  farther  off  from  New  Hampshire  than  it 
now  is.  He  had  previously  been  made  chairman  of  the 
great  convention  at  Harrisburg  which  nominated  Gen- 
eral Harrison  in  1840,  and  had  received  from  Leslie 
Coombs,  of  Kentucky,  this  compliment : 

"  General  "Wilson,  you  were  sent  to  New  Hampshire, 
but  you  were  misdirected:  you  were  meant  for  Ken- 
tucky." 

His  great  stature,  his  love  of  field  sports,  captivated 
the  ardent  soul  of  the  Kentuckian,  and  I  think  my 
father  had  always  sighed  for  a  buffalo-hunt  and  a  chase 
over  the  prairies. 

He  took  up  his  temporary  official  residence  in  Du- 
buque, Iowa,  and  I  was  to  accompany  him  thither.  My 
mother  did  not  relish  the  idea  of  so  long  a  journey,  but 
to  me  it  was  like  a  flight  into  Paradise.    "We  were  to 


18  AN  EPISTLE  TO  POSTERITY 

go  to  Washington  first,  then,  as  now,  the  Mecca  of  the 
American  girl. 

"Washington,  March,  184—. 

"Dearest  Mother, — We  were  a  week  getting  here,  but  I  have  en- 
joyed every  hour.  Father  took  me  to  the  Astor  House,  New  York, 
where  we  met  the  whole  Whig  party  I  should  say  ;  Mr.  Ashmun,  Mr. 
Geo.  T.  Davis,  and  a  sweet  old  gentleman,  Judge  Story.  Mrs.  Otis, 
and  Mrs.  Bates,  were  there  and  very  nice  to  me.  I  went  shopping, 
in  a  fine  shop,  and  bought  some  gloves,  and  handkerchiefs,  and  some 
ribbons.  The  Astor  House  is  very  comfortable,  and  I  saw  all  the 
fashion  walk  by.  The  Astor  House  parlor  seems  the  centre  of  fash- 
ion. It  is  a  very  grand  Hotel,  and  from  the  ladies  who  walk  by  in 
red  velvet  I  get  a  picture  of  the  great  people  of  New  York. 

"Just  think,  next  Tuesday  I  shall  be  in  Washington,  not  to  see  old 
Tippecanoe,  but  only  "Tyler  too."  Father  is  very  cross  on  that  sub- 
ject. 

"  Ever  your  loving 

"M.  E." 

To  go  back  a  few  months,  my  mother  and  I  had  gone 
through  the  campaign  for  "  Tippecanoe  and  Tyler  too  " 
in  emphatic  fashion.  We  had  accompanied  my  father, 
who  was  so  favorite  a  "  stump  speaker  "  on  the  Whig 
side  that  wherever  he  went  thousands  of  people  and 
a  militar}''  band  accompanied  us. 

We  had  had  the  honor  of  receiving  Mr.  Webster  as 
our  guest  in  Keene,  and  he  had  asked  us  to  visit  him 
at  Marshfield,  his  famous  country-seat  on  the  sea.  To 
proceed  thither  to  see  our  great  hero,  accompanied  by  a 
brass  band,  was  rather  exciting  for  a  girl  of  thirteen, 
and  to  be  met  by  Mrs.  Webster  in  her  carriage  (all  in 
white,  a  fine-looking,  dark-eyed  woman)  seemed  to  me 
to  be  very  distinguished.  My  mother  and  a  friend  were 
placed  in  the  seat  of  honor,  and  I  was  asked  to  mount 
the  box  in  which  Mr.  Webster  was  driving  himself.  To 
say  that  I  was  frightened  as  those  big  black  eyes  swept 
me  up  is  to  state  it  mildly ;  but  I  lived  through  it,  and 


DANIEL  WEBSTER   AT  MARSHFIELD  19 

since  I  was  young  and  small  I  was  allowed  the  seat 
next  to  Mr.  Webster  on  the  driver's  box.  How  elated 
I  felt  as  my  tall  father  put  me  up  there,  and  he  whis- 
pered in  my  ear,  "  Eemember  this,  my  daughter :  you 
are  to  drive  five  miles  with  Daniel  Webster  as  your 
coachman !" 

It  Avas  the  most  impressive  and  attractive  thing  about 
Mr.  Webster  that  all  his  friends  called  him  always 
"Daniel  Webster."  My  coachman,  who  was  dressed 
in  a  plain  suit  of  gray,  with  a  wide-awake  hat  and  a 
loosely  tied  neckerchief  of  red,'  began  immediately  to 
make  himself  agreeable. 

"  So  this  is  your  first  visit  to  the  sea.  Miss  Wilson  ?'* 
said  he. 

I  could  have  told  him  that  he  was  the  first  person  to 
address  me  as  "  Miss  "  Wilson.  I  was  not  old  enough 
for  titles  then. 

And  so  he  went  on  smiling  and  showing  me  his 
splendid  teeth,  which  were  as  white  and  regular  as  a 
string  of  pearls,  looking  down  on  me  with  his  great 
black  eyes,  which  were  fabulously  handsome.  He 
pointed  out  to  me  Seth  Peterson,  who  was  walking 
along  the  road,  and  who  stopped  to  take  some  orders 
from  his  fellow-fisherman. 

"  You  will  eat  to-day  some  fish  which  Seth  and  I 
caught  this  morning,"  said  Mr.  Webster. 

I  was  frightened  to  death,  but  I  made  a  lucky  hit  by 
asking  what  sort  of  fish  were  the  easiest  to  catch. 

He  launched  off  on  his  favorite  subject,  and  told  me 
of  the  gamey  bass  and  the  reluctant  cod  and  so  on ; 
when  I  again  said : 

"I  suppose  you  enjoy  the  fish  which  are  the  hardest 
to  catch,  don't  you,  Mr.  Webster?" 

He  looked  round  at  me  and  laughed.     "  You  are  be- 


20  AN   EPISTLE   TO   POSTEKITY 

ginning  young,  Miss  Wilson,"  said  he ;  "  that  is  the  re- 
mark of  a  coquette." 

And  at  dinner  he  embarrassed  me  very  much  by  re- 
peating this  conversation  as  a  piece  of  youthful  precocity. 

Our  drive  was  only  too  short,  as  we  soon  reached  the 
long,  low,  pleasant  white  house  known  as  Marshfield. 

Mrs.  Webster — a  Miss  Le  Koy  by  birth — had  very  dis- 
tinguished manners,  and  I  felt  awed  as  she  received  me 
every  day  with  a  lofty  courtesy  on  the  veranda. 

The  house  was  full  of  company.  Judge  Warren,  a 
famous  wit,  was  there.  Mr.  Webster  laughed  at  every- 
thing he  said.  A  great  Whig  demonstration  had  just 
taken  place,  and  one  man  had  put  the  flag  in  a  sheaf  of 
wheat  as  his  part  of  the  procession.  "  He  didn't  want 
things  to  go  against  the  grain,"  said  Judge  Warren. 

The  dinner  was  profuse  and  excellent.  Mr.  Webster 
had  dressed  for  it,  and  looked  so  grand  in  his  blue  coat 
and  brass  buttons  that  I  was  more  and  more  afraid  of 
him ;  but  he  grew  more  and  more  kind. 

He  offered  a  goose  for  the  piece  de  resistance,  and 
carved  it  himself  with  great  deftness.  He  afterwards 
whispered  to  me  that  he  was  afraid  it  would  not  go 
round. 

Every  day  for  a  week  he  gave  me  the  honor  and 
pleasure  of  a  drive,  and  every  day  the  company  changed. 
I  liked  him  best  in  the  mornings,  when,  Avith  his  soft  hat 
on  his  head,  he  sat  on  the  veranda  with  his  dogs  and  his 
friends,  talking,  telling  stories,  and  being  the  genial  and 
magnetic  host. 

He  of  all  men  next  to  Napoleon  deserved  the  title  of 
magnetic.  His  powerful  face,  so  often  described,  so 
characterized  by  Carlyle,  Macaulay,  and  Sydney  Smith, 
was  capable  of  the  most  lustrous  and  winning  and  beau- 
tiful smile  I  can  remember.    Had  Mr.  Webster  been,  like 


DANIEL   WEBSTER   AT   MARSHFIELD  21 

Charles  James  Fox^  a  professional  lady-killer,  he  would 
have  won  every  woman  in  the  land.  But  I  never 
heard  that  he  went  into  the  business  of  flirtation 
at  all. 

He  could  be  as  terrible  as  he  was  gentle,  and  we  had 
a  curious  instance  of  his  power.  Mrs.  Webster  com- 
plained to  him  of  the  revolt  of  a  kitchen-maid.  "  Send 
her  to  me,"  he  said. 

The  housekeeper  told  us  that  he  simply  looked  at  her, 
when  she  cried  out,  "  Don't  do  that !  don't  do  that !  I 
will  scrub  the  buttery !" 

It  was  like  a  lash  on  sensitive  flesh  to  have  his  black 
eyes  flash  their  lightning  at  one. 

Before  I  left  Marshfield  Mrs.  Webster  gave  me  a  ring — 
a  ruby  circlet — which  I  wore  for  many  years.  Down  in 
the  West  Indies,  on  my  wedding  journey,  this  ring  was 
stolen  from  me,  to  my  infinite  sorrow ;  but  the  memory 
of  it,  and  of  her  kindness  in  giving  it  to  me,  I  have  never 
lost. 

One  day  Mr.  Webster  turned  suddenly  and  asked  me 
if  I  knew  any  of  Watts's  hymns ;  to  my  regret  I  did 
not,  when  he  quoted  two  or  three,  and  also  some  lines 
of  Walter  Scott.  He  talked  of  Burns,  Shakespeare,  and 
Milton,  and  after  dinner  some  lady  sang  one  of  Burns's 
songs. 

His  daughter,  Mrs.  Sam  Appleton  Appleton,  was  stay- 
ing in  the  house,  a  very  interesting  woman,  whom  he 
much  loved ;  when  he  approached  her  he  always  kissed 
her  hand,  which  amazed  me,  it  was  so  stately.  He  told 
me  much  of  his  visit  to  England  and  of  the  delightful 
people  he  had  met  there,  and  often  took  me  to  drive, 
telling  me  about  the  sea  grasses  and  the  fish  which  he 
had  caught  in  the  morning.  I  can  feel  anew,  as  I  write, 
the  fragrant   salt  sea-breeze,  forever  refreshing   that 


22  AN   EPISTLE   TO   POSTERITY 

favored  coast  which  outlined  Marshfield,  touching  my 
youthful  cheeks  with  its  caressing  fingers. 

Mr.  Webster's  dinners  in  "Washington,  in  Louisburg 
Square,  were  well  ordered  and  well  served — more  elabo- 
rate than  those  of  Marshfield.  A  good  ochra  soup ;  a 
fish,  fresh  and  admirably  gotten  up ;  a  turkey,  roasted 
and  basted  as  only  Monica  could  do  it ;  oysters,  scal- 
loped, fried,  or  broiled ;  sometimes  terrapin,  and  often 
ducks,  are  the  dishes  I  remember.  He  had  a  way  of 
talking  about  eacli  dish,  and  I  remember  his  comment- 
ing on  a  salt-codfish  salad,  as  a  "  dish  ^  fit '  to  eat."  Then 
he  went  into  a  long  discourse  as  to  the  meaning  of  the 
w^ord  "  fi t " — he  knew  his  English  very  well.  He  laughed 
at  the  criticisms  on  his  having  said,  "  The  nomination 
of  Taylor  was  one  not  'fit'  to  be  made." 

As  I  remembered  him  at  Marshfield,  Mr.  Webster's 
conversation  was  like  a  great  organ  playing,  and  his 
smile  was  grandly  beautiful.  I  had  listened  with  an 
affectionate  reverence  akin  to  awe,  and  when  I  left  he 
gave  me  a  DrummondJ's  Botany^  with  his  valuable  auto-, 
graph : 

"  To  Miss  Mary  Elizabeth  Wilson  : 

"Taken  from  bis  own  library  at  Marsbfield  for  her,  and  offered  by 
lier  friend,  Danl.  Webster." 

It  is  unnecessary  to  say  that  I  have  that  book  still. 

Thus  my  visit  to  Washington  was  to  me  chiefly  valu- 
able that  I  might  see  Mr.  Webster  again. 

And  at  a  Presidential  levee  I  had  that  honor.  He 
came  in  in  full  evening  dress,  very  carefully  groomed, 
his  black  hair  brushed  back  from  that  extraordinary 
forehead ;  he  was  the  observed  of  all  observers.  When 
my  turn  came  and  my  father  mentioned  modestly, 
"  Here  is  my  little  girl,"  he  took  my  hand  in  both  of 


23 

his  and  said,  with  a  splendid  smile,  "  What,  my  little 
woman  Avho  likes  sea-weed !" 

The  next  day  my  father  took  me  to  Mrs.  Webster's 
reception.  The  house  of  the  Secretary  of  State  was  the 
great  attraction ;  it  was  full  of  brilliant  company.  Mrs. 
Webster's  nieces  and  some  other  fashionable  ladies  from 
New  York  were  there,  many  of  the  diplomatic  circle, 
and  a  number  of  literary  women — Miss  Sedgwick,  Mrs. 
Sigourney,  of  Hartford,  our  JSTew  England  poetess, ''  that 
woman,"  as  Judge  Wayne  said,  i'  who  will  die  guiltless 
of  anything  but  a  false  quantity."  I  was  more  pleased 
with  them  than  with  any  other  part  of  the  show,  for  I 
had  already  written  Mrs.  Sigourney  a  letter  (anony- 
mously) admiring  her  poem, "  On  a  Shred  of  Linen." 
How  I  wanted  to  ask  her  if  she  had  ever  received  it, 
and  whether  she  had  enjoyed  it !  but  I  remembered  just 
in  time  that  the  character  of  the  anonymous  admirer 
forbade  that.  Suddenly  there  was  a  stir  in  the  room, 
and  all  these  ladies  rose. 

A  young  Englishman,  named  Charles  Dickens,  entered 
the  room.     Then  my  heart  stopped  beating. 

I  had  read  Pickwick  and  several  of  his  novels,  and, 
like  all  the  world,  I  admired  and  wondered  how  a  genius 
looked.  I  can  see  him  now,  overdressed,  with  billows 
of  green-satin  necktie,  long  hair,  a  rather  handsome 
face,  and  hanging  on  his  arm  a  pretty  little  fat,  rosy- 
cheeked  wife. 

I  also  remember  (and  I  fear  no  one  else  does)  what  I 
wore  on  this  momentous  occasion :  a  black- velvet  tight- 
fitting  jacket  with  gold  buttons  down  the  front,  and  a 
skirt  of  deep  blue,  heavily  flounced.  I  fear  this  fashion 
was  stolen  from  Fanny  Elssler,  but  the  dress  was  "  made 
in  Boston."  I  saw  that  other  ladies  wore  this  tight 
jacket  with  tight  sleeves,  so  I  knew  I  was  correct.    We 


Z4  AN   EPISTLE  TO   POSTERITY 

had  bonnets  on,  and  I  remember  thinking  that  Mrs. 
Dickens's  bonnet  was  dowdy.  When  we  got  into  the 
carriage  I  said  to  my  father,  "  Oh !  I  am  so  glad  that 
mother  allowed  me  this  pretty  dress !" 

"Whereupon  he  addressed  me  severely.  "  My  daughter, 
I  am  sorr}^  that  after  such  an  afternoon,  when  you  have 
met  so  many  distinguished  people,  you  should  be  think- 
ing  of  your  clothes." 

However,  he  was  soon  propitiated,  and  took  me  to 
the  Senate  Chamber  next  da}^,  where  I  looked  down  on 
the  great  of  the  earth  and  saw  Charles  Dickens  sitting 
in  a  seat  near  the  Chairman. 

I  remember  Mr.  Tyler,  the  President,  as  a  man  with  a 
long  nose  and  thin  figure,  but  a  courteous  Virginia 
gentleman.  It  all  made  a  great  impression  on  me,  par- 
ticularly Mr.  Webster,  who  loomed  up  more  and  more 
splendid.  I  think  I  remember  him  (and  my  velvet 
jacket)  best  of  all. 

Then  we  departed  for  a  long,  fatiguing  journey  from 
Harrisburg  to  Wheeling  by  stage-coach.  Splendid  scen- 
ery, but  nothing  decent  to  eat  for  three  days  and  nights. 
I  slept  on  my  dear  father's  shoulder.  He  was  so  kind, 
so  tender,  so  sweet  to  me,  that  I  can  never  think  of  this 
journey  without  my  eyes  getting  a  little  moist ;  for  after 
we  reached  the  Ohio  River,  all  blushing  with  the  red- 
bud  along  its  banks,  and  got  on  the  comfortable  steam- 
boat, I  found  that  he  was  ailing.  He,  however,  did  not 
allow  me  to  be  annoyed,  and  it  was  to  me  a  cotillon 
party  which  lasted  a  week;  for  the  colored  waiters 
made  a  very  good  band,  the  saloon  a  nice  ballroom,  and 
we  danced  every  evening.  I  remember  being  appalled 
by  one  very  solemn  partner,  who  led  me  off  in  a  cotillon 
by  the  formidable  remark, ''  Dancing,  madame,  is  a  great 
solvent  of  discontent." 


ALONG   THE   OHIO  AND   DOWN   THE   MISSISSIPPI  25 

"  Yes,  sir,"  I  said,  not  knowing  what  else  to  say.  As 
I  had  never  had  any  discontent,  and  did  not  very  well 
remember  what  solvent  meant,  I  was  somewhat  dis- 
couraged. However,  the  order  came,  "  Ladies  cross 
over,"  and  I  bounded  off  willingly.  I  learned  after- 
wards that  he  was  the  governor  of  some  Western  State, 
and  he  made  his  peace  by  bringing  me  next  day  great 
bunches  of  the  beautiful  redbud  from  the  shore. 

We  paused  often  to  take  on  freight  and  passengers 
at  places  which  Dickens  was  afterwards  to  make  im- 
mortal in  Martin  Chuzzlewit ;  but  although  they  did 
look  rather  forlorn,  I  never  knew  of  the  fact  until  long 
after.  I  suppose  "  dancing  had  been  the  solvent  of  my 
discontent,"  for  I  never  was  happier ;  and  I  remember 
that  Ohio  River  steamboat,  the  good  food,  the  music  of 
that  negro  band,  and  the  courtesy  of  the  Western  cap- 
tain with  great  delight.  The  Ohio  is  a  magnificent 
river.  The  season  was  spring.  I  kept  on  making  mis- 
takes, and  blushing  for  fear  that  my  father  would  call 
me  "  Mary  Elizabeth,"  which  was  the  beginning  of  a 
scolding ;  but  I  suppose  the  bloom  of  youth  must  have 
covered  a  multitude  of  sins,  for  I  always  seemed  to  come 
up  smiling.  In  fact,  "  life  was  a  joke  which  had  just 
begun,"  and  I  had  Piclcwiclc  and  Oliver  Twist  to  read. 
The  guards  of  that  boat,  looking  out  on  the  moving  pan- 
orama of  the  Ohio,  was  an  ideal  place  to  sit  of  a  warm 
spring  morning.  I  was  travelling  into  the  Unknown, 
and  it  was  like  the  fabled  stuff  of  Damascus — whichever 
way  you  turned  it,  it  was  scarlet  and  gold. 

Sorrow  was  not  far  off,  for  when  we  got  to  St.  Louis 
my  father  broke  down  with  a  severe  illness,  and  we  were 
there  three  weeks  in  the  house  of  a  dear  set  of  cousins, 
who  saved  his  life. 

I  saw  things  with  sadly  anxious  eyes ;  the  city,  now  so 


26  AN   EPISTLE    TO   POSTERITY 

great  and  then  so  small,  St.  Louis,  full  of  French  people 
and  Northern  people  and  Southern  people  and  negroes. 
It  did  not  look  as  it  does  now.  To  my  great  horror  and 
amazement,  my  cousins  owned  slaves,  and  their  backyard 
was  full  of  pickaninnies.  I  remember  two  great  men — 
the  Reverend  Mr.  Elliot,  one  of  our  Unitarian  saints, 
and  Mr.  Holmes,  now  Professor  of  Law  at  Harvard, 
then  a  young  lawyer,  and  the  author  of  a  book  to  prove 
that  Shakespeare  did  not  write  ShaTcesjpeare  ;  also  some 
pretty,  very  agreeable  women ;  but  my  heart  was  too 
heavy  to  allow  me  to  notice  much,  and  I  was  too  young 
to  be  a  philosophic  observer.  My  father  and  I,  after  his 
recovery,  started  off  up  the  Mississippi,  that  muddy, 
great,  dark  river,  and  I  always  felt  the  force  of  the  sub- 
sequent witticism  when  the  indignant  Yankee  answered 
the  assuming  Briton,  "You  could  stir  the  whole  of  England 
into  the  Mississippi  without  making  it  a  bit  muddier." 

We  had  the  same  cotillon  party  and  most  interesting 
companions.  I  suppose  "  Elijah  Pogram  "  or  his  proto- 
type was  on  board,  but  I  do  not  remember  him.  Of  all 
the  ways  of  travel,  I  remember  none  which  were  so 
agreeable  as  these  floating  palaces,  on  which  we  lazily 
encompassed  such  vast  distances. 

One  day  we  stopped  at  JS'auvoo,  the  first  settlement  of 
the  Mormons.  My  father  knew  Joe  Smith,  their  first 
Prophet.  He  had  been  a  bricklayer  at  Keene,  and  had 
not  laid  his  bricks  even  and  well.  He  and  a  man  from 
Peterboro,  where  my  father  was  born,  Jesse  Little,  I 
think,  came  down  and  invited  us  up  to  see  their  great 
temple,  resting  on  the  shoulders  of  carved  wooden  oxen. 
It  was  impressive,  but  the  general  effect  was  more  like 
the  Eden  of  Charles  Dickens,  which  was  yet  to  be  de- 
scribed, than  any  other  place  I  remember.  They  were 
already  in  trouble,  and  I  think  made  their  exodus  the 


JOSEPH   SMITH   AND   THE   MORMONS  27 

next  year.  But  here  I  may  be  mistaken.  I  remember 
hearing  then  the  romantic  story,  now  denied,  that  they 
had  found  Mr.  Spaulding's  book  by  accident,  and  made 
it  their  Bible. 

This  was  perhaps  the  most  small  beginning  of  what 
has  proved,  after  Mahomet,  the  most  extraordinary  sto- 
ry in  the  whole  world  of  religious  fanaticism  and  the 
one-man  fower.  Even  the  Massanielo  frenzy  pales  be- 
fore it.  At  any  rate,  to  have  seen  this  their  beginning 
is  interesting  now  by  the  light  of  subsequent  events.  It 
is  not  the  man  who  starts  well  in  the  race  of  whom  we 
make  a  hero,  but  he  who  reaches  the  goal  and  ends 
well.  These  queer  and  dirty  and  disreputable  Mormons 
became  the  most  successful  of  colonists  in  their  new 
home  beyond  the  Eockies.  They  redeemed  the  dry 
land  by  irrigation,  as  the  Moors  enriched  sandy  Spain ; 
and  their  religious  tenets,  absurd  and  abhorrent  to  the 
rest  of  us,  have  for  them  a  power  and  a  strong  hold 
which  would  put  to  shame  many  a  Protestant  church. 

I  see  it  still,  that  ragged,  dirty,  uneven  shore  of  the 
great  Mississippi,  the  lazy  steamboat-landing,  the  pigs  of 
lead  being  discharged  or  loaded  on — I  forget  which.  The 
story  used  to  run  that  the  Mormons  always  dropped  two 
or  three  in  the  river  by  accident,  but  fished  them  up 
and  appropriated  them  afterwards.  They  had  a  bad 
name,  but,  unlike  the  dog,  it  did  not  hang  them.  The 
Mormons  were  destined  to  live  down  a  great  deal  of 
bad  name.  I  suppose  that  great  wooden  temple  and  the 
carved  oxen  had  been  built  by  some  of  their  foreign 
converts  who  had  a  knowledge  of  wood-carving. 

Joe  Smith,  the  then  head  of  the  Church,  the  bad 
bricklayer,  had  "builded  better  than  he  knew,"  or,  as 
they  used  to  say  in  Keene,  when  I  told  them  this 
story,  "  better  than  he  knew  how  when  he  was  here." 


CHAPTER  II 

Visit  to  Dubuque  and  the  "Wisconsin  Prairies  — A  Steamboat  Trip 
through  tlie  Great  Lakes  with  Mr.  Van  Buren  and  J.  K.  Paul- 
ding— Chicago  and  Mayor  Ogden — James  Russell  Lowell  and 
Maria  White  —  A  Visit  to  the  "Experiment"  at  Brook  Farm 
— Mr.  Ripley,  Mr.  Curtis,  Hawthorne,  and  Margaret  Fuller. 

It  would  astonish  the  good  citizens  of  Dubuque, 
Iowa,  of  to-day  if  I  should  tell  them  what  a  small, 
pretty  village  theirs  was  when  I  first  saw  it;  how 
immense  prairies  filled  with  wild  flowers  stretched  back 
from  the  great  bluff  (I  suppose  that  is  there  still)  which 
defends  their  State  of  Iowa  from  the  rolling  Mississippi, 
and  what  a  little  row  of  houses  clustered  under  the  hill. 
Beyond  on  the  prairies  lived  some  of  our  friends,  who 
were  early  settlers.  We  used  to  go  out  for  a  day  and  a 
night,  and  had  some  log-cabin  experiences  not  always 
pleasant. 

One  of  our  friends,  a  Philadelphia  gentleman,  had 
married  a  fair-haired  wife,  and  they  Avere  "  roughing  it 
on  the  plains."  Among  their  live-stock  was  a  fawn, 
the  most  beautiful  creature  possible.  I  loved  and  pet- 
ted this  gentle  animal,  and  was  shocked  when  one  day 
I  was  asked  to  come  out  and  eat  him. 

He  had  grown  troublesome,  I  suppose.  This  was  bad 
enough,  but,  what  was  worse,  he  was  shot  before  my 
eyes  after  I  got  there,  and  I  saw  the  dying  look  in 
his  splendid  eyes.  This  effectually  spoiled  the  effect  of 
the  venison  for  me ;  as  sad  a  story,  I  thought,  as  that  of 


VISIT   TO    DUBUQUE  AND   THE   WISCONSIN  PKAIEIES        29 

the  "  Falcon."  Tennyson  should  have  immortalized  that 
fawn.  And  my  friends  were  not,  like  the  master  of  the 
falcon,  driven  to  killing  the  fawn  by  poverty,  for  their 
fields  were  full  of  sheep,  and  their  coops  overladen 
with  turkeys  and  geese,  while  the  prairie  swarmed  with 
the  famous  grouse,  brown  as  a  berry. 

I  had  some  very  tragic  experiences  at  this  log-cabin  of 
my  friends.  Once,  in  my  bed,  I  looked  up  at  the  logs 
at  the  head,  and  through  the  crevices  I  saw  a  black  snake 
wriggling  his  dreadful  head.  It  was  a  good  reminder  to 
rise  early  and  often.  After  this  I  determined  never  to 
undertake  frontier  life.  There  were  many  dreary  hours 
in  spite  of  the  romance  in  this  visit  to  the  then  extreme 
West;  but  my  father  was  Surveyor-General  of  Iowa 
under  the  Whig  administration,  and  he  had  to  be  there. 
Perpetually  driving  over  the  great  prairies  on  his  busi- 
ness, he  often  took  me,  and  I  really  have  seen  more  of 
the  unbroken  and  beautiful  ocean  of  grass,  ornamented 
and  gemmed  with  wild  flowers,  than  many  a  frontiers- 
man. We  made  a  journey  once  of  three  days  to  Madi- 
son, Wisconsin,  that  pretty  town  of  four  fine  lakes.  We 
were  the  guests  of  Governor  and  Mrs.  Doty,  and  I  re- 
member the  house  was  so  full  that  the  rooms  were  par- 
titioned with  sheets.  We  slept  on  the  way  at  log-cabins 
of  settlers  as  we  drove  along ;  and  once  our  little  carriage, 
with  my  absurdly  big  trunk  in  front,  nearly  tipped  into 
a  stream  we  were  fording.  My  father's  great  form  was 
in  the  stream  instantly,  and  he  held  us  all  up  out  of  the 
water — carriage,  trunk,  and  daughter.  Fortunately,  we 
had  to  drive  in  a  burning  sun  for  two  hours,  so  he  got 
thoroughly  dried.  The  sorrowful  prairie  wives  and 
mothers,  mostl}^  emigrants  from  New  England,  used  to 
move  my  soul  to  pity  in  this  journey.  They  all  had  the 
ague,  were  taking  care  of  a  crying  baby,  and  yet  found 


80  AN   EPISTLE   TO   POSTEEITY 

time  to  cook  the  prairie-chickens  which  my  father  had 
shot  on  the  way.  Some  of  them,  seeing  my  sympathy, 
w^oulcl  talk  to  me  far  into  the  night,  teUing  me  a  mourn- 
ful story.  I  used  to  drive  away  with  my  e3^es  full  of 
tears.  Three  days  going  and  three  days  coming  back 
over  this  endless  camjpagna,  and  a  subsequent  drive  to 
Milwaukee  to  take  the  steamer  thence  for  home,  satisfied 
me  with  a  knowledge  of  the  State  of  Wisconsin  as  it 
then  was.  But  it  had  a  charm  (in  common  with  the 
Campagna  at  Rome)  like  the  sea,  and  it  gave  me  many 
romantic  dreams  when  I  returned  to  the  well-regulated 
and  comfortable  life  of  New  England. 

The  life  on  horseback  ^vhich  I  led  at  Dubuque  and 
these  drives  re-established  my  health,  and  I  had  no  more 
pains  in  my  chest.  Our  journey  home  through  the  great 
lakes  w^as  even  more  delightful  than  that  up  the  Ohio 
and  Mississippi.  The  steamboats  w^ere  models  of  com- 
fort, and  the  same  cotillon  party,  lasting  a  fortnight, 
w^ent  on  every  evening.  As  I  was  the  youngest  person 
on  board,  I  had  no  end  of  partners,  and  there  were  two 
most  eligible  elderly  beaux  to  talk  to  of  mornings. 

These  were  the  Hon.  Martin  Yan  Buren,  ex-President, 
and  his  friend,  James  K.  Paulding,  who  had  been  one 
of  his  cabinet.  This  latter  gentleman,  Avell  known 
to  the  literary  world,  was  very  indignant  at  the  at- 
tentions which  were  then  being  showered  on  Dickens, 
"a  mere  London  newspaper  reporter,"  as  he  used  to 
say.  One  age  must,  however,  gracefully  retire  before 
another. 

Mr.  Yan  Buren  and  Mr.  Paulding  were  charming  gen- 
tlemen and  the  best  and  kindest  of  friends.  Mr.  Yan 
Buren  was  especially  courtly — a  little,  natty  man,  with 
his  head  on  one  side  and  the  air  of  being  fresh  from  the 
barber.     I  used  to  tell  his  witty  son,  John  Yan  Buren, 


CHICAGO  AND   MAYOR   OGDEN  31 

of  this  steamboat  flirtation  afterwards,  after  I  had  grown 
older  and  was  married. 

''  Oh,  he  always  had  good  taste,"  said  the  ready 
"  Prince  John,"  w^ho  should  have  written  his  own  me- 
moirs. 

We  stopped  at  a  little,  mean,  muddy  town  known  as 
Chicago.  The  mayor,  William  B.  Ogden,  came  down 
to  the  boat  and  drove  us  up  to  a  beautiful  villa  in  the 
heart  of  the  town.  It  was  surrounded  by  trees  and 
quite  redeemed  the  otherwise  barren  outlook.  That  site 
is  now  so  covered  with  bricks  and  mortar  that  I  have 
never  even  attempted  to  identify  it  during  my  subsequent 
visits  to  that  magnificent  town.  There  he  was  laying 
the  foundations  of  the  great  fortune  which  is  now  en- 
joyed by  his  descendants;  there  he  built  an  undying 
memorial  of  himself — the  man  of  energy,  accomplish- 
ments, and  a  kind  heart. 

I  saw  Niagara  on  my  way  home,  and  nearly  tumbled 
oif  Table  Rock.  We  went  up  there  in  a  mist,  and  I  got 
very  wet.  I  remember  my  father  was  so  angry  with  me 
that  he  would  not  speak  to  me  all  the  way  to  Albany. 
I  sat  shivering  in  my  wet  garments,  and  quivering  with 
a  sense  of  injustice,  for  it  had  not  been  my  fault  at  all 
that  Niagara  was  wet. 

But  when  I  was  taken  in  the  night  with  a  chill,  fol- 
lowed by  a  fever,  he  forgave.  In  a  few  days  w^e  were 
at  home,  and  my  mother  was  taking  care  of  me  and 
looking  over  my  stained  and  spoiled  dresses.  I  was 
thought  to  be  ready  for  a  very  stern  governess,  who 
proceeded  to  wring  out  of  me  all  ideas  of  superiority, 
airs  of  having  seen  the  world,  and  visions  of  past  joy. 
I  went  through  all  tliat  New  England  could  do  to  im- 
press me  with  the  idea  that  I  was  a  miserable  sinner. 

Had  it  not  been  for  books  I  should  wish  to  forget 


32  AN   EPISTLE   TO   POSTERITY 

some  of  these  subsequent  years ;  but  I  would  keep  one 
most  pleasant  memory,  that  of  seeing  Mr.  Lowell  and 
his  lovely  Maria  White.  O  the  blessed  damozel !  I 
went  to  Watertown  to  visit  her  sisters,  the  Misses  White, 
and  there  I  found  this  pretty  idyl  of  a  love  affair  go- 
ing on. 

The  Whites  lived  in  a  grand  house,  of  limitless  ca- 
pacity, at  Watertown.  This  house  seemed  ever  to  be 
full,  for  each  sister  had  a  friend  staying  with  her ;  and 
although  there  were  five  sisters  at  home,  yet  there  was 
always  room  for  one  more.  I  remember  that  the  beau- 
tiful, dark -eyed  Misses  Gilman,  the  daughters  of  the 
poetess  Caroline  Gilman,  and  the  reverend  doctor,  their 
father,  were  there,  and  visitors  for  lunch  and  tea  were 
always  arriving.  And  here  for  the  first  time  I  saw  that 
extraordinary  genius,  William  Henry  Ilurlbert. 

But  I  had  eyes  only  for  Maria,  the  blue-eyed  beauty, 
the  genius,  with  eyes  lighted  from  behind  and  the  smile 
which  seemed  to  illumine  the  earth !  She  was  a  jpre- 
destinee.  Consumption  had  even  then  marked  her  for 
its  own,  and  although  she  lived  fourteen  years  after 
that  she  always  walked  with  death  at  her  side.  Per- 
haps a  certain  unearthly  quality  of  her  beauty  was 
owing  to  the  influence  of  this  maladj^,  which  is  known 
to  cast  a  radiance  over  its  victims.  But  Maria  White 
had  no  appearance  then  of  an  invalid.  Her  skin  was 
beautifully  fair,  with  no  hectic  in  the  cheeks,  no  color 
save  the  red  of  her  lips ;  her  hair,  which  was  very  pro- 
fuse and  worn  in  bandeaux  over  -the  ears,  was  a  rich 
auburn  brown,  and  her  eyes  very  light  blue,  with  long 
lashes ;  her  teeth  were  a  feature  by  themselves,  so  white, 
so  perfect,  and  so  regular,  a  set  of  graduated  pearls. 
She  was  not  a  large  woman  nor  a  small  one,  rather 
slender   than  otherwise,   perfectly  graceful   and  well- 


JAMES   KUSSELL    LOWELL   AND   MARIA   WHITE  33 

made.    The  expression  of  the  face  was  rapt,  spiritual, 
poetic.     I  never  saw  such  eyes. 

Perhaps  she  saw  with  pleasure  the  admiration  which 
she  inspired  in  my  youthful  heart,  for  she  was  very  kind 
to  me,  and  showed  me  her  work,  smiling.  She  did 
fancy-work  beautifully  (japanning,  I  believe,  it  is  called), 
painting  flowers  in  gold-leaf  on  a  black  ground.  She 
used  to  ornament  tables,  clocks,  desks,  chairs,  and  other 
pieces  in  this  manner  with  exquisite  taste.  I  saw  on 
her  table  a  box,  which  looked  Ijke  a  great  Bible,  and 
it  had  painted  on  it,  by  her,  these  words : 

"  THE  GOLDEN  LEGEND 

*'Here  lies  within  this  golden  legend  fair 
Of  love  and  life  the  noble  mystery. 
Life  sullies  not  its  lily  pages  fair, 
Death  writes  no  Finis  to  its  history." 

"  These  are  James's  letters,"  she  said,  giving  me  one 
of  her  rare  smiles.  She  always  smiled  when  she  spoke 
of  him. 

I  saw  much  of  this  courtship,  destined  one  day  to 
be  the  property  of  the  world,  from  the  distinction  which 
both  lovers  won  by  their  talents. 

All  courtships  are  beautiful,  or  should  be.  This  one 
had  every  element  of  beauty.  Mr.  Lowell  was  singu- 
larly handsome  in  his  young  manhood.  Paige  painted 
him  when  he  was  a  Titian  young  man  with  reddish 
beard  and  affluent  curling  hair,  deep-blue  eyes,  and  a 
ruddy  cheek.  Afterwards,  when  he  was  Minister  to 
England,  I  spoke  to  him  of  that  portrait  and  those 
days.  "  You  see,"  said  he,  "  I  didn't  grow  old  hand- 
somely." Nor  did  he.  The  trials  of  his  life,  and  they 
were  many,  had  marked  his  face  and  marred  his  color- 


34  AN    EPISTLE    TO   POSTERITY 

ing ;  but  it  made  no  difference  how  he  looked,  he  was 
always  the  same  delightful,  witty,  and  distinguished 
man. 

Together  the  lovers  might  have  played  Eomeo  and 
Juliet,  Francesca  da  Rimini  and  Paolo,  or  indeed  any- 
thing Italian  and  romantic.  I  visited  them  at  their 
home  at  Elmwood  afterwards,  and  they  drove  me  to 
Mount  Auburn,  hearing  that  I  had  never  seen  it.  Only 
the  other  day,  after  many  years,  I  went  to  lay  a  rose 
on  their  graves. 

Mr.  Lowell  was  very  fond  of  telling  stories,  of  writing 
f unn}^  verses ;  and  once  after  his  sister  and  myself  re- 
turned from  a  journey  to  Lake  Superior,  bringing  with 
us  some  moss -agates  and  the  account  of  a  gentleman 
named  Moss,  he  burst  out  with  an  impromptu  supposed 
to  have  been  written  by  that  gentleman : 

"Together  once  we  chanced  to  cross 
Ontario's  inland  sea. 
What  wonder  that  a  lonely  ;Moss 
A  lichen  took  to  thee  ! 

"And  as  our  boat  went  pitch  and  toss, 
Thou  on  ray  arm  wouldst  lean  ; 
Forgive  my  hopes  !  how  could  a  moss 
Be  otherwise  than  green  ? 

"And  if  again  our  paths  should  cross, 
Thou  there  wilt  surely  see 
All  withered  hang  a  lonely  Moss 
Dependent  from  a  tree!" 

I  do  not  think  the  lovely  Maria  had  so  much  love  of 
humor  as  her  lover  husband  ;  their  sympathy  was  rather 
on  the  poetic  and  humanitarian  side.  She  was  an  ear- 
nest abolitionist,  and  drew  him  over  to  work  and  feel 
with  her.     They  spent  the  first  year  of  their  married 


JAMES   RUSSELL    LOWELL   AND   HIS   WIFE  35 

life  in  Philadelphia,  in  deference  to  her  delicate  lungs. 
They  lived  with  a  Quaker  family  named  Lamborn,  and 
from  Dr.  Lamborn,  their  son,  I  heard  many  details  later 
on  of  that  year  of  happiness.  James  delighted  to  see 
Maria  dress  in  the  Quaker  garb,  which  was  becoming  to 
her,  and  used  to  surprise  the  Quaker  circle  invited  to 
tea  by  entering  suddenly  and  kissing  the  demure  Quaker 
sister — a  joke  which  never  failed  to  delight  Mrs.  Lam- 
born. 

I  did  not  see  Mrs.  Lowell  after  the  death  of  her  chil- 
dren, or  when  disease  had  made  its  ravages ;  so  I  retain, 
as  few  people  can,  a  memory  of  that  transcendent  love- 
liness of  her  youth.  Of  Mr.  Lowell  I  continued  to  see  a 
great  deal,  and  after  her  death  he  sent  me  a  volume  of 
her  poems,  and  her  portrait  (from  one  by  Paige).  He 
also  asked  to  see  several  letters  she  had  written  to  me 
after  the  death  of  her  children,  when  he  was  calling  at 
my  house  in  'New  York.  I  left  him  alone  with  them  in 
my  parlor,  and  he  took  his  leave  without  bidding  me 
adieu.  He  afterwards  wrote  me  one  of  his  choice  let- 
ters, thanking  me,  and  adding,  *'  Which  was  most  beauti- 
ful, her  body  or  her  soul  V'  He  often  dined  with  me  in 
New  York,  bringing  with  him  the  rarefied  air  of  Cam- 
bridge, and  of  all  the  recent  good  things  said  by  Charles 
Norton,  Agassiz,  Holmes,  James  T.  Fields,  John  Holmes, 
and  the  Illuminatl  generally. 

What  a  society  of  wits  and  scholars  that  was!  I 
remember,  in  ray  visits  to  Boston,  meeting  them  all,  at 
dinners,  teas,  at  the  opera  and  theatre.  Imagine  the 
sensation  of  having  Mr.  Prescott  come  and  talk  to  one 
at  the  opera ! 

My  father  took  my  mother,  myself,  and  Miss  Lois 
White  (the  heroine  of  the  moss-agate  poem)  up  to  Lake 
Superior  in  the  summer  of  one  of  the  late  forties.  We  saw 


36  AN   EPISTLE    TO   POSTERITY 

the  great  copper-mines,  the  wonders  of  that  inland  sea ; 
we  saw  Mackinac,  most  romantic  of  islands ;  we  went  to 
Dubuque,  and  already  it  had  begun  to  grow.  I  have 
never  seen  the  Mississippi  since,  nor  Mackinac,  nor  the 
great  lakes,  excepting  to  glance  across  the  one  at 
St.  Louis  and  New  Orleans  and  to  feel  the  breezes  of 
Lake  Michigan  at  Chicago ;  but  I  pay  my  parting  tribute 
to  the  old  steamboat  way  of  crossing  them.  It  was 
transcendent.  I  should  like  to  make  those  journeys  again. 

In  one  of  my  visits  to  Boston,  it  may  have  been  in  the 
spring  of  1847, 1  was  taken  out  to  see  Brook  Farm,  that 
experiment  of  Fourierism  which  led  perhaps  to  the  writ- 
ing of  the  Blitliedale  Romance. 

I  knew  very  little  of  the  w^ri tings  of  Fourier,  or  his 
romantic  economic  scheme  that  men  and  women  were 
so  perfect  that  they  could  all  live  together  under  one 
common  roof,  or  in  phalanxes,  dividing  the  labor,  and  en- 
joying in  groups  of  fifty  or  one  hundred  one  common 
fire  which  should  cook  the  common  dinner.  "  Why 
must  a  man  and  a  woman  be  shut  up  in  cages  which 
they  call  homes,  each  Avasting  extravagantly  fire  and 
food  ?"  was  one  of  the  favorite  remarks  of  the  Fourier- 
ites. 

A  few  Transcendentalists,  with  Reverend  George  Eip- 
lej^  at  their  head,  were  making  the  first  experiment  out 
at  West  Roxbury,  in  a  wooden  house,  which,  as  I  saw  it, 
■was  painfully  crowded.  Mr.  William  White,  a  brother- 
in-law  of  Mr.  Lowell,  and  his  sisters,  were  so  good  as  to 
take  me  there  to  tea ;  and  although  I  have  forgotten 
much  else,  I  shall  always  remember  that  intellectual 
group  in  the  long,  low,  crowded  room,  one  hot  evening 
in  July.  The  lady  who  received  us  did  so  while  hastily 
pulling  down  her  sleeves,  explaining  that  she  had  been 
in  the  "  washing  group." 


BKOOK   FARM  37 

Mr.  Frank  Shaw  was  furnishing  them  the  money  to 
build  their  new  Phalanstery,  which,  Avhen  completed, 
burned  down,  and  Mr.  Shaw  never  got  his  money  back. 
We  met  his  beautiful  wife  as  we  neared  the  "experi- 
ment," and  she  asked  us  to  her  house  to  tea.  We  were 
sorry  afterwards  that  we  had  not  accepted,  for  the  whole 
menage,  I  regret  to  remember,  seemed  very  wanting  in 
cleanliness  and  care. 

George  William  and  Burrill  Curtis  were  conspicuous 
there,  in  blue  blouses,  like  i>ench  workmen.  Mr. 
Eipley,  who  sat  at  the  head  of  the  table,  talked  su- 
premely well.  He  was  a  most  striking  figure,  and  every 
one  was  so  intellectual  and  superior  that  one  wished, 
had  it  been  less  warm  and  more  fragrant,  to  stay  there. 
Mr.  Eipley,  who  afterwards  became  a  very  dear  friend 
of  mine  in  'New  York  society,  often  spoke  of  that  glimpse 
of  mine  at  what  had  been  to  him  a  painful  disappoint- 
ment. He  told  me  how  badly  some  characters  "  panned 
out,"  how  many  illusions  he  lost.  "  It  all  went  up  in 
smoke,"  he  said ;  and  yet  the  theory  seemed  most  plau- 
sible. 

Margaret  Fuller,  who  had  always  struck  me  as  a  very 
plain  woman,  was  the  oracle.  She  had  a  very  long  neck, 
which  Dr.  Holmes  described  "  as  either  being  swan-like 
or  suggesting  the  great  ophidian  who  betrayed  our 
Mother  Eve."  She  had  a  habit  of  craning  her  head  for- 
ward as  if  her  hearing  were  defective;  but  she  had  a 
set  of  woman -worshippers  who  said  that  the  flowers 
faded  when  she  did  not  appear. 

She  was  the  Aspasia  of  this  great  council.  She  seemed 
to  have  a  special  relationship  to  each  of  the  intellectual 
men  about  her,  discerning  and  reading  them  better  than 
they  did  themselves.  Some  one  said  of  her  that  she  was 
a  kind  of  spiritual  fortune-teller,  and  that  her  eyes  were 


38  AN    EPISTLE    TO    POSTERITY 

at  times  visible  in  the  dark.  Their  devotion  to  her  was 
akin  to  fanaticism,  and  they  would  talk  of  the  magic 
play  of  her  voice  as  the  singing  of  a  fountain.  She  had 
a  very  kind  way  to  the  colored  stage-driver,  who  was  the 
Mr.  Weller  of  Concord,  and  he  distinguished  her  by  his 
respect.  The  "  chambermaid  would  confide  to  her  her 
homely  romance."  The  better  class  of  young  Cam- 
bridge students  believed  in  her  as  though  she  had  been 
a  learned  professor.  Her  all -seeing  eye  could  shoot 
through  the  problems  which  engaged  them.  Many 
distinguished  men  kept  this  opinion  of  her  to  their 
deaths.  With  such  wonderful  imagination  and  a  gen- 
ius like  that  of  George  Eliot,  there  was  much  that  was 
morbid  and  unhealthy  and  strange  in  Margaret  Fuller. 
She  was  a  victim  of  dreadful  headaches  all  her  life,  but 
she  said  that  "  pain  acted  like  a  girdle  to  her  powers," 
and  between  laughing  and  crying  she  would  utter  her 
most  witty  words. 

There  was  a  singular  mixture  of  faculties  in  this  gifted 
woman.  She  was  fully  conscious  of  the  male  intellect 
in  which  was  incarnate  her  truly  sensitive  feminine 
heart.  She  had  a  tendency  to  dally  with  stories  of  spells 
and  charms,  and  really  thought  she  had  (if  she  turned 
her  head  one  side)  the  power  of  s«3ond-sight. 

This  is  not  my  own  description.  I  have  compiled  it 
from  the  words  of  others,  for  I  did  not  see  much  of  her 
or  know  her  well  enough  to  have  written  so  powerful  an 
elucidation.  She  w^rote  these  lines  on  herself,  but  ad- 
dressed to  the  moon : 

"  But  if  I  steadfast  gaze  upon  iby  face  , 
A  human  secret,  like  my  own,  I  trace  ; 
For  through  the  woman's  smile  looks  the  male  eye" 

Her  wonderful  eloquence  and  electric  spirit  gave  to 


BROOK   FARM  39 

her  conversations  an  impress! veness  and  influence  which 
cannot  be  inferred  from  the  records  kept  of  them. 

They  were  not  always  free  from  the  ludicrous,  and  the 
daily  papers  made  fun  of  her.  Everybody  had  a  mot  as 
to  what  Emerson  said  and  what  Margaret  said,  and  it  is 
fair  to  observe  that,  although  Emerson  was  the  brain 
and  Margaret  the  blood,  the  two  spoke  a  great  deal 
of  nonsense.  Certainly  after  the  epoch  of  social  recon- 
struction failed,  and  when  Margaret  left  them,  Transcen- 
dentalism broke  to  pieces,  like  a  cpsmical  ring,  each  piece 
flying  off  to  revolve  in  its  own  orbit. 

I  can  only  remember  how  much  e  he  was  talked  about 
all  my  youth,  and  sometimes  laughed  at.  Zenobia,  Haw- 
thorne's beautiful  dream,  supposed  to  somewhat  embody 
Margaret  Fuller,  has  embalmed  her  and  put  her  in  the 
world's  picture-gallery  forever. 

I  ought  to  have  seen  Hawthorne  at  Brook  Farm,  but 
I  did  not.  I  have  to  accept  George  William  Curtis's 
splendid  description  of  him : 

"  A  statue  of  Night  and  Silence,  gazing  imperturbably 
upon  the  group ;  and  as  he  sat  in  the  shadow,  his  dark 
hair  and  eyes  and  suit  of  sable  made  him  in  that  so- 
ciety like  the  black  thread  of  mystery  which  he  weaves 
into  his  stories." 

This,  contrasted  with  the  cheerful  and  human  pict- 
ure of  Hawthorne  ^vritten  lately  (1896)  by  his  daugh- 
ter, Mrs.  Rose  Hawthorne  Lathrop,  makes  Hawthorne 
two  such  different  men  that  we  can  only  solve  the 
problem  by  quoting  Goethe's  mother :  "  When  my  son 
has  a  grief  he  makes  a  poem  of  it,  and  so  gets  rid 
of  it." 

When  Hawthorne  had  a  sombre  mystery  he  made  a 
story  out  of  it,  and  so  got  rid  of  it,  possibly.  We  are 
very  grateful  to  him  for  confiding  his  mysteries  to  us — 


40  AN   EPISTLE   TO    POSTERITY 

that  man  of  immense  genius,  that  prince  of  all  the 
romance  writers  who  use  our  English  speech,  for  his 
mastery  of  language  was  unique,  and  also  his  exquisite 
grace  of  comedy,  which  appears  in  his  English  Notes. 

"  The  hunger  of  an  age  is  alike  a  presentiment  and 
a  pledge  of  its  own  supply."  The  demand  for  wom- 
an's emancipation  of  thought,  her  breadth  of  freedom  of 
action,  met  with  its  first  great  interpreter  in  Margaret 
Fuller :  she  fed  that  first  hunger. 

From  the  glimmer  of  twihght's  solitude  through  which 
Hawthorne's  shrewd  and  curious  eye  dissected  the 
movements  of  the  human  heart,  Margaret  Fuller  might 
have  seemed  to  be  like  Zenobia,  but  I  did  not  think  it  a 
portrait. 

The  terribly  tragic  end  of  that  life,  which  was  so 
noble,  generous,  and  helpful,  has  placed  Margaret  Fuller 
above  criticism,  and  one  only  wishes  that  to  his  sombre 
studies  Hawthorne  might  have  added  that  shipwrecked, 
faithful  woman  holding  her  child  to  her  breast.  His 
exquisitely  delicate  genius,  refined  away  almost  to  gos- 
samer, would  then  have  encased  them  both  in  a  web  of 
alabaster  like  that  which  was  found  in  the  rooms  of  the 
Borgias. 


CHAPTER  III 

Washington  in  the  Forties — General  Franklin  Pierce — The  Mexican 
War — John  Quincy  Adams,  Lincoln,  Calhoun,  Benton,  and  Clay 
— A  Sight  for  Northern  "Doughfaces"  —  The  7th -of -March 
Speech — Chester  Harding — Two  Stories  of  Webster — President 
Tyler's  Inauguration— State  Balls  and  Dinners — The  Society  of 
the  Caj^ital  Half  a  Century  Ago. 

The  life  in  New  England  was  a  studious  one,  but  not 
gay,  although  the  irrepressible  spirit  of  sixteen  got  some 
dancing  out  of  it.  The  vision  of  Washington  to  come  was 
a  not  ungrateful  one,  and,  although  I  have  referred  to  it 
before,  I  may  be  allowed  to  speak  for  a  moment  of  the 
political  situation  which  obtained  when  I  exchanged 
New  England  for  Washington.  My  father  had  always 
been  very  kind  and  familiar  in  his  talks  with  his  chil- 
dren about  politics  as  well  as  everything  else.  I  had 
hated  General  Jackson  as  a  child,  as  the  Scotch  children 
hated  the  Bruce ;  and  although  I  had  seen  with  my  own 
eyes  that  Mr.  Yan  Buren  was  not  an  ogre,  I  had  still  a 
very  poor  opinion  of  his  character.  A  girl  brought  up 
in  the  old  Whig  party  had  no  idea  which  favored  "  Loco- 
focos,"  as  the  Democrats  were  called.  Antislavery  agi- 
tation at  the  North  was  growing  more  intense  every 
day.  We  had  gone  through  the  Mexican  war.  I  knew 
by  heart  the  name  of  every  hero  in  it ;  we  were  waiting 
to  know  now  what  was  to  become  of  the  territory  won 
by  that  war.  Our  friend  and  neighbor  General  Franklin 
Pierce,  although  my  father's  political  foe,  was  a  very 
agreeable  guest  at  our  dinner-table.    He  had  gone  to  the 


42  AN    EPISTLE   TO   POSTERITY 

war,  and  it  had  made  him  President ;  although,  poor 
man !  he  would  have  been  better  off  without  that  dis- 
tinction. As  we  look  back  upon  it  now,  we  see  that 
the  time  held  the  "  irrepressible  conflict "  (the  "  im- 
mortal march  "  of  Eoger  A.  Pry  or)  in  the  rude  Wilmot 
Proviso,  the  Compromise  Resolutions,  etc. ;  and  I  re- 
member John  Quincy  Adams  in  the  House  of  Repre- 
sentatives, with  his  noble  old  head,  battling  for  the 
North.  Mr.  Clay  and  Mr.  Webster  were  "  compromis- 
ing," as  were  most  of  the  Northern  Whigs.  It  was  in- 
tensely exciting,  and  rather  mortifying  to  Northerners. 

Mr.  Lincoln,  then  obscure  but  for  his  great  height, 
was  towering  physically  above  everybody,  as  he  was 
later  on  to  tower  mentally  and  morally  above  us  all ; 
but  no  one  suspected  his  greatness  then. 

John  Went  worth,  of  Chicago,  six  feet  seven ;  Caleb 
Cushing,  and  George  Ashmun,  with  his  bright  black 
eyes  burning  with  genius,  his  fine,  shining  bald  head, 
were  among  those  who  were  on  the  floor  of  the  House. 
I  have  forgotten  many  of  the  others,  but  these  were 
the  days  when  I  knew  the  House  of  Representatives 
very  well  and  heard  many  good  speeches. 

Mr.  Winthrop,  prince  of  Speakers,  was  in  the  chair. 
General  Scott,  fresh  from  triumphs  in  Mexico,  walked 
about  outside.  I  once  saw  him,  Mr.  Lincoln,  John 
Wentworth,  and  my  father  talking  together  in  the 
lobby,  and  my  father,  who  was  six  feet  four,  was  the 
shortest  of  the  quartet. 

In  the  Senate,  Mr.  Calhoun,  Mr.  Benton,  Mr.  Clay,  and 
Mr.  Berrian  made  that  scene  notable.  Rufus  Choate 
was  in  the  Senate  in  the  John  Tyler  days,  a  very  fervid 
orator  and  man  of  genius.  Later  on  Mr.  Polk  was  in 
the  White  House  surrounded  by  an  army  of  Southern 
sympathizers.     This  was  in  1847. 


A   SCENE   IN   WASHINGTON  43 

As  one  fine  spring  day  we  were  looking  from  our  win- 
dows in  Four-and-a-IIalf  Street  we  saw  a  great  commo- 
tion and  outcry.  It  was  the  most  heart-breaking  scene 
I  have  ever  witnessed. 

It  was  a  cargo  of  runaway  slaves  who  had  been 
caught  in  Chesapeake  Bay  trying  to  get  away  from 
cruel  masters.  They  had  been  becalmed,  and  so  capt- 
ured. Their  fate  was  to  be  taken  to  Northern  or  to 
Washington  jails,  and  then  to  be  whipped  and  sent 
back  again.  The  captain  of  the  little  craft  which  had 
essayed  to  save  them  was  being  carried  up  to  the  jail  in 
a  carriage,  guarded  by  soldiers,  else  the  citizens  of  Wash- 
ington would  have  murdered  him,  so  strongly  Southern 
was  the  feeling  there.  I  remember  one  poor  negro 
mother  with  a  baby  in  her  arms,  and  two  or  three  picka- 
ninnies hanging  to  her  skirts,  being  whipped  along  with 
the  rest.  Her  face  with  its  hopeless  agony  is  before  me 
to-day,  a  greater  picture  than  that  of  the  Cenci. 

What  a  sight  that  was  for  a  ISTorthern  girl  to  see! 
Mr.  Ashmun  stood  at  my  side,  and  as  he  watched  the 
impotent  tears  fall  down  my  cheeks  he  said : 

"  God  moves  in  a  mysterious  way 
His  wonders  to  perform." 

And  yet,  after  all  that,  we  had  to  hear  our  idol,  Mr. 
Webster,  make  the  7th-of-March  speech. 

I  have  never  been  able  to  decide  whether  it  was  be- 
cause his  great  and  well-informed  mind  saw  the  other 
side  so  clearly  that  it  could  not  see  the  right  side, 
or  whether  it  was  because  he  so  much  desired  to  be 
President,  that  he  on  that  occasion  advocated  com- 
promise and  temporizing.  It  killed  him,  this  Fabian 
policy.  Had  he  taken  strongly  the  ^N'orthern  view,  the 
view   which  Abraham  Lincoln  took,  "Z>(9  riglit  —  and 


44  AN    EPISTLE   TO    POSTERITY 

sleejp^''  he  would  have  been  the  next  President,  and  the 
war  would  have  been  averted,  for  it  would  have  been 
unnecessary. 

My  little  part  in  that  great  day,  the  7th  of  March, 
was  this :  Ladies  were  to  be  admitted  on  the  floor  of 
the  Senate,  and  my  father  got  me  the  seat  of  General 
Greene,  of  Ehode  Island,  very  near  Mr.  Webster.  The 
venerable  and  beautiful  Mrs.  Madison  and  Mrs.  Web- 
ster sat  not  far  off,  while  everybody  of  distinction  in 
Washington  and  crowds  from  Boston  and  JS^ew  York 
were  present.  Mr.  Webster  rose,  dressed  in  buff  and 
blu^,  the  colors  of  Fox,  which  he  always  wore  on  great 
occasions — a  dress-coat  buttoned  across  the  waist  over 
a  yellow  vest — his  great  face  serious,  splendid ;  his  cav- 
ernous eyes  glowing  with  fire,  his  hair  carefully  brushed 
back  from  his  majestic  forehead. 

Surely  "  no  one  could  be  so  great  as  he  looked."  He 
had  not  proceeded  far  when  Mr.  Calhoun  jumped  to  his 
feet,  making  some  objection  to  what  he  said.  "  The 
gentleman  from  South  Carolina  and  I  have  broken  a 
lance  before  this,"  said  Mr.  Webster.  "  I  have  no  de- 
sire to  do  so  again,"  said  Mr.  Calhoun,  "  but — "  etc. 

Mr.  Calhoun  w^as  dying ;  in  fact,  he  died  on  the  30th 
of  the  month.  His  face  was  spectral,  and  his  stiff  gray 
hair,  which  he  brushed  upward,  gave  a  peculiar  expres- 
sion to  his  very  marked  appearance.  This  7th  of  March 
was  his  last  appearance  in  the  Senate.  He  made  on 
that  occasion  his  most  remarkable  prophecy :  "  Sir,  the 
Union  can  be  broken."  But  neither  of  these  great  men 
knew  that  it  not  only  could  be  and  would  be  broken, 
but  that  it  could  be  cemented  together  again,  alas !  by 
a  mingling  of  the  best  blood  on  both  sides  —  a  cement 
which,  please  God !  shall  hold  it  through  the  ages.  It 
seems  now  impossible  that  the  great  logical  mind  of  Mr. 


THE   8EVENTH-0F-MARCH   SPEECH  45 

Webster  should  have  forgotten  an  impressive  phrase 
from  Lord  Bacon  which  he  had  quoted  in  his  famous 
letter  to  the  "  Citizens  on  the  Kennebec  Kiver  " : 

"  Among  the  maxims  left  us  by  Lord  Bacon,  one  is, 
that  when  seditions  or  discontents  arise  in  the  state  the 
part  of  wisdom  is  to  remove,  by  all  means  possible,  the 
causes.  The  surest  way  to  prevent  discontents,  if  the 
times  will  bear  it,"  he  says,  "  is  to  take  away  the  matter 
of  them ;  for  if  there  be  fuel  prepared  it  is  hard  to  tell 
w^hence  the  spark  shall  come  that  shall  set  it  on  fire." 

Slavery  was  that  cause  which  should  then  and  there 
have  been  removed. 

But  these  great  topics  are  beyond  the  meaning  and 
the  purpose  of  these  rambling  recollections.  A  young 
girl  listening  to  a  giant  w^as  not  thinking  of  the  past  or 
the  future ;  she  was  probably  very  much  more  interested 
in  her  own  present. 

But  she  was  conscious  of  a  great  thud  of  disappoint- 
ment, and  was  very  angry  when  a  beau  of  the  period, 
Mr.  Cabell,  of  Virginia,  said  to  her :  ''  Less  than  that 
concession  of  Mr.  Webster  would  have  dissolved  the 
Union."  Many  years  after  in  St.  Louis,  having  suffered 
extensively  from  the  evils  of  secession,  Mr.  Cabell  talked 
to  me  in  a  very  different  strain. 

Of  the  great  we  of  the  lesser  type  have  a  right  to 
cherish  all  memories,  however  trivial ;  it  therefore  is  to 
me,  who  saw  this  great  man  when  I  was  a  child,  and  af- 
terwards when  I  was  a  young  woman,  a  great  pleasure 
to  recall  his  smile,  his  careful  dress,  his  commanding 
beauty,  and  his  unvarying  kindness.  My  memories  of 
him  in  the  Senate  and  in  society  are  not  less  vivid  and 
delightful  than  of  the  days  at  Marshfield.  I  saw  him 
in  the  Capitol  as  he  was  sitting  to  Healy  for  one  of  his 
best  portraits.    He  seemed  perfect,  and  I  ceased  to  ques- 


46  AN    EPISTLE   TO   POSTERITY 

tion,  as  we  should  all  do,  Avhat  strain  of  hnman  imperfec- 
tion it  was  that  clouded  this  celebrated  life ;  why  he  was 
not  more  successful  in  the  minor  matters  of  every  day ; 
why  he  did  not  see  more  clearly  what  others  thought 
to  be  the  right ;  why  there  was  one  thread  of  logic  that 
he  did  not  find  and  follow — and  so  we  should  all  cease 
to  question.  To-day  I  know  no  greater  pleasure  than 
to  read  his  letters  and  his  speeches. 

Speaking  of  portraits  of  Mr.  Webster,  the  earliest  one, 
by  Chester  Harding  (that  man  of  genius  who  used  to 
make  Gilbert  Stuart  jealous,  as  his  young  fame  in  1823 
made  the  older  man  ask,  "  How  rages  the  Harding 
fever?"),  is,  I  think,  in  the  Boston  Athenaeum.  They 
are  all  good.  I  sat  to  Harding  in  my  girlhood.  He  used 
to  talk  to  me  of  Webster  as  of  a  man  whom  he  really 
worshipped.  He  had  a  thorough  comprehension  of  his 
subject,  for  he  was  a  great  man  himself.  He  enjoyed 
for  many  years  an  enviable  intimacy  with  Mr.  Webster 
and  his  family,  and  he  said,  "  The  more  unrestrained  our 
intercourse  grew  the  greater  man  he  seemed  to  be." 
He  was  fond  of  telling  of  his  taking  a  bottle  of  "  moun- 
tain-dew "  to  Mr.  Webster.  Leaving  the  bottle  on  the 
hall  table,  he  went  in  to  the  parlor  and  said,  "I  have  left 
a  Scotch  gentleman  of  my  acquaintance  outside ;  may  I 
bring  him  in?"  On  receiving  a  ready  assent  he  produced 
the  bottle  (he  had  previously  told  Mr.  Webster  that  this 
beverage  must  be  taken  with  hot  water  and  sugar). 

"Oh,"  said  Mr.  Webster,  receiving  the  bottle  with 
gravity,  "  is  this  the  gentleman  who  always  bathes  in 
hot  water?" 

Chester  Harding  was  born  in  1792,  in  North  Conway, 
'New  Hampshire ;  he  died  in  Boston  in  1866,  having 
painted  nearly  every  one  of  note  in  that  city.  His  fame 
grew  to  be  a  national  one,  and  his  last  portrait  was  that 


CHESTER   HARDING — TWO    STORIES   OF   WEBSTER  47 

of  General  Sherman,  painted  in  1866.  He  had  been  in 
England,  and  had  studied  under  Leslie  and  Sir  Thomas 
Lawrence.  He  painted  portraits  of  his  Koyal  Highness 
the  Duke  of  Sussex,  the  Duke  of  Hamilton,  the  Duke 
of  ISTorfolk,  Allison  the  historian,  and  Samuel  Kogers. 
He  always  held  a  high  social  position  wherever  he  went. 
He  was  a  grand -looking  man,  and  in  his  old  age,  with 
a  white  beard,  he  sat  to  an  artist  for  a  head  of  St.  Peter. 
A  characteristic  of  his  portraits  was  their  suggestive- 
ness  of  temperament  and  character.  But  in  the  fine 
lines  which  ISTature  draws  upon  the  living  face  the 
artist  should  be  inspired  to  read  that  half  -  hidden  hand- 
writing. In  this  Chester  Harding  excelled,  and  there- 
fore his  pictures  of  Webster  are  valuable.  His  conver- 
sation was  always  rare  and  instructive,  and  never  more 
agreeable  than  w^hen  he  talked  of  Mr.  Webster. 

I  remember  one  anecdote  of  Mr.  Webster's  immense 
personal  charm  told  me  by  Mr.  W.  W.  Story,  of  Eome. 

"  James  Lowell  and  I,"  said  he,  "  were  very  angry 
with  Webster  for  staying  in  old  Tyler's  cabinet,  and  as 
he  was  to  speak  in  Faneuil  Hall  on  the  evening  of  the 
30th  of  September,  1842,  we  determined  to  go  in  and 
hoot  at  him  and  to  show  him  that  he  had  incurred  our 
displeasure.  There  were  three  thousand  people  there,  and 
we  felt  sure  they  w^ould  hoot  with  us,  young  as  we  were. 

"  But  we  reckoned  without  our  host.  Mr.  Webster, 
beautifully  dressed,  stepped  calmly  forward.  His  great 
eyes  looked,  as  I  shall  always  think,  straight  at  me.  I 
pulled  off  my  hat ;  James  pulled  off  his.  We  both  be- 
came cold  as  ice  and  respectful  as  Indian  coolies.  I  saw 
James  turn  pale ;  he  said  I  was  livid.  And  when  the 
great  creature  began  that  most  beautiful  exordium  our 
scorn  turned  to  deepest  admiration,  from  abject  contempt 
to  belief  and  approbation." 


48  AN    EPISTLE   TO   POSTERITY 

Mr.  Webster  talked  one  evening  of  his  past,  the  past 
of  the  "Reply  to  Hayne."  He  told  us  how  Mrs.  Gales 
had  saved  it  for  him,  as  she  could  read  her  husband's 
shorthand,  which  no  one  else  could.  I  remember  that 
Miss  Susan  Benton  was  of  this  party — a  very  gifted 
girl,  and  the  daughter  of  the  great  Missouri  Senator. 
Mr.  Seward  often  joined  us  in  our  after-dinner  walks 
to  the  Capitol.  These  twilight  strolls  to  these  beau- 
tiful grounds  were  very  fashionable  then.  We  dined 
at  five  o'clock,  and  had  a  long  summer  evening  to 
get  rid  of.  How  primitive  Washington  was  in  those 
days!  But  what  good  society  this  was  during  the  long 
session ! 

A  small,  straggling  city,  with  very  muddy  streets  in 
Avinter ;  plain  living  and  high  thinking ;  rather  uncom- 
fortable quarters  in  the  hotels  and  boarding-houses; 
here  and  there  a  grand  house,  but  not  many  of  them ; 
the  White  House,  serene  and  squalid ;  a  few  large  pub- 
lic buildings ;  the  Capitol,  with  its  splendid  dome,  like 
an  architect's  dream,  overhanging  and  dominating  the 
scene,  as  it  does  to-day,  one  of  the  most  splendid  public 
buildings  in  the  civilized  world.  Such  was  the  early 
Washington  to  me. 

I  came  to  Washington  as  a  very  young  girl,  and  was, 
of  course,  dazzled.  I  have  only  indistinct  memories  as 
to  having  seen  the  last  years  of  Mr.  Polk's  administra- 
tion and  the  first  of  General  Taylor's.  That  was  my  first 
inauguration,  and  I  remember  it  very  well.  What  a  cold, 
driving  March  day  it  was !  What  dreary  waiting  in  a 
crowded  part  of  the  rotunda  and  the  Supreme  Court 
room  !  We  had  two  friends — Mr.  Dixon,  of  Connecticut, 
and  Mr.  Justice  Wayne,  of  the  Supreme  Court — to  put 
us  through,  and  so  we  had  very  good  chances.  I  re- 
member now  the  impressive  group  as  Judge  Taney  ad- 


PRESIDENT   TAYLOR  S   INAUGURATION   BALL  49 

ministered  the  oath  to  the  sturdy  little  general.  Judge 
Taney  looked  like  the  recently  deceased  Cardinal  Man- 
ning. 

But  the  ball !  That  was  the  great  expectation.  "We 
went  with  ten  thousand  others  to  a  sort  of  shed  —  a 
large  wooden  barracks — and  spermaceti  rained  down  on 
our  bare  shoulders  in  a  white  snow-storm.  One  of  our 
gentlemen  attendants,  looking  at  his  coat,  said :  "  Sper- 
maceti is  very  expensive.  I  have  paid  ten  dollars  for 
less  than  a  pound."  However,  we  enjoyed  the  crowd, 
the  dance,  and  the  novelty.  Had  the  grippe  been  the 
fashion  I  should  have  died  then  and  there,  and  you  would 
have  been  spared  these  rambling  recollections.  But  we 
never  seemed  to  take  cold  in  those  days.  "Washington 
was  cold  and  dreary  in  winter  then ;  the  houses  were 
insufficiently  heated,  the  hotels  abominable. 

The  belles  of  that  ball — how  differently  they  were 
dressed  from  those  of  to-day !  Falling  ringlets,  or  the 
hair  in  bandeaux  put  under  the  ears ;  a  low-cut  gown 
with  a  berthe  across  the  shoulders ;  a  plain  skirt  or  one 
with  two  lace  flounces ;  a  rose  or  a  bow  in  front  of  the 
corsage ;  perhaps  a  pearl  necklace ;  white  kid  gloves  but- 
toning at  the  wrist  with  one  button. 

A  few  ladies  wore  white  feathers.  I  think  Mrs.  Bliss, 
the  delightful  daughter  of  President  Taylor,  wore  a  red 
velvet  dress  and  one  long  feather  in  her  hair.  She  was  al- 
ways lovely  and  well  apparelled.  Yery  few  ladies  wore 
jewelry.  I  remember  Madame  Bodisco  was  famous  then 
with  a  Russian  head-dress  full  of  diamonds.  The  wife 
of  the  English  Minister,  Lady  Bulwer,  wore  handsome 
diamonds,  but  American  women  had  not  then  adopted 
coronets.  Nor  was  there  anything  like  the  display  so 
common  now  of  handsome  jewelry.  The  young  girls 
were  very  simply  dressed,  excepting  some  from  Louis- 


50  AN   EPISTLE   TO   POSTERITY 

ville  and  IS'ew  Orleans.  Great  beauties,  like  Sallie  Ward 
and  Diana  Bullitt,  would  be  famously  dressed,  but  they 
were  the  exceptions.  Being  a  Northerner,  an  abolition- 
ist, and  a  Whig,  it  was  certain  that  my  dearest  friends 
should  be  Southern  girls  and  Democrats.  We  never 
talked  politics,  but  wondered  that  we  liked  each  other 
so  much.  I  adored  them — these  beautiful  women  with 
soft  voices  and  gentle  eyes  who  had  been  brought  up  so 
differently  from  what  I  had  been.  They  were  accus- 
tomed to  be  waited  on ;  had  had  a  dozen  slaves  about 
them  all  their  lives,  while  I  had  been  taught  in  cold  New 
England  to  wait  on  myself.  But  we  met  on  the  common 
ground  of  youth  and  love  of  pleasure.  I  used  to  admire 
their  pretty  Southern  accent  and  try  to  imitate  it.  They 
did  not  so  much  admire  mine,  and  told  me  I  spoke  too 
fiercely.  We  differed,  too,  on  the  subject  of  engage- 
ments. 

"Why,  Miss  AYilson,"  said  one  of  these  dear  sirens, 
"  I'd  just  as  lief  be  engaged  to  five  men  at  once,  and  then 
I'd  pick  out  the  best  man  at  last  and  just  marry  him." 

I  gave  her,  I  dare  say,  a  Puritan  lecture  on  constancy, 
at  which  she  laughed.  Oh,  such  a  musical  laugh !  Her 
brother  was  one  of  my  beaux,  and  she  said  to  me : 

"  JSTow,  Miss  Wilson,  you  needn't  marry  Preston,  be- 
cause you're  a  wicked  abolitionist;  but  you  just  get 
engaged  to  him  and  come  down  to  Georgia  and  pay  us 
a  visit." 

It  was  through  the  friendship  of  one  of  these  dear 
Southern  friends  that  I  was  smuggled  in  to  a  dinner  at 
Mrs.  Polk's,  just  before  she  left  the  White  House.  I  re- 
member how  very  long  it  seemed  and  how  dreary — state 
dinners  at  sixteen  are  dreary.  The  dinner  was  a  very 
elegant  one,  and  I  can  now  see  Mrs.  Ashley's  plumes 
across  the  table.    Mrs.  Ashley  was  a  very  handsome 


SOCIETY   OF   THE    CAPITAL    HALF   A    CENTUEY    AGO         51 

widow  with  a  very  handsome  daughter,  Miss  Wilcox. 
Mrs.  Ashley  was  afterwards  the  wife  of  the  Hon.  J.  J. 
Crittenden.  She  was  a  most  amiable  woman,  who  al- 
ways called  every  man  colonel  or  general.  ("  Always 
give  men  brevet  rank,"  she  said  to  me,  confidentially. 
"If  they  are  colonels  call  them  general;  if  they  are 
captains  call  them  colonel.  They  will  forgive  you.") 
Mrs.  Ashley  could  say  a  sharp  thing  when  occasion  re- 
quired. She  once  said  to  me  that  a  certain  lady,  who 
had  always  been  very  jealous  of  her,  had  bought  of  her 
a  French  invoice,  a  toilette,  which  she,  going  into  mourn- 
ing, could  not  wear.  This  other  woman  sent  back  the 
slippers  after  having  worn  them,  saying,  "  They  are  too 
big.  I  could  swim  in  them."  Mrs.  Ashley  took  them 
calmly,  and  looking  at  them  remarked,  "  My  dear,  I  am 
a  larger  woman  than  you  are  in  every  respect." 

The  President's  "  levees,"  as  we  used  to  call  them, 
were  very  much  smaller  than  to-day,  but  they  were  very 
like  them.  I  always  wonder  what  we  did  for  light  in 
those  days,  as  oil  lamps,  always  smoky,  and  candles,  al- 
ways dripping,  are  all  that  these  splendid  affairs  had  to 
use  in  place  of  the  diamond  brilliancy  of  to-day.  I  once 
went  up-stairs  in  the  White  House  to  search  for  a  pair 
of  overshoes,  and  I  remember  there  was  one  candle  in 
that  immense  hall.     I  can  see  now  that  feeble  glimmer. 

Mr.  Corcoran  gave  fine  dinners;  so  did  the  English 
and  French  ministers ;  but  elsewhere  I  do  not  remember 
anything  like  the  luxury  of  to-day.  Indeed,  it  did  not 
exist,  and  those  who  could  afford  it  did  not  care  for  it. 
John  Quincy  Adams,  whose  magnificent  head  was  the 
pride  of  the  House,  whose  fame  made  him  our  first 
citizen,  who  was  a  rich  man,  lived  plainly  in  rather  a 
Southern  fashion.  It  was  a  great  treat  to  be  permitted 
to  see  Mrs.  Adams,  who  had  been,  as  Mr.  Everett  told 


53  AN   EPISTLE   TO    POSTERITY 

me,  one  of  the  most  admirable  hostesses  of  the  White 
House  —  her  conversation  was  charming.  It  was  the 
fashion  to  be  poor  in  Washington  in  those  days,  and  I 
remember  the  witty  Henry  A.  Wise,  who  had  just  then 
published  his  clever  book,  Los  Gringos^  when  he  became 
engaged  to  the  brilliant  Miss  Charlotte  Everett,  saying 
to  his  fellow-officers :  "  Don't  be  afraid.  She  is  so  un- 
lucky as  to  have  some  money,  but  she  is  a  good  fellow 
for  all  that."  What  a  witty  man  he  was,  and  how  much 
we  enjoyed  the  suppers  at  the  Mays',  of  which  he  Avas  a 
factor ! 

Then  there  were  quiet  literary  parties  at  Mrs.  Frank 
Taylor's,  where  we  met  a  very  remarkable  man,  Mr. 
George  Wood,  who  wrote  Peter  Schlemihl  /  or,  The  Man 
without  a  Shadow.  Mr.  Wood  used  to  take  us  to  see  Mr. 
King's  pictures,  and  he  introduced  us  to  charming,  quiet 
people,  who  were  the  citizens  of  Washington,  mostly 
Southern  by  descent,  and  those  ladies  would  sit  in  plain 
black  silks  and  dark  gloves  to  receive  their  guests.  It 
was  a  splendid  distinction  then,  as  now,  to  be  asked  to  the 
White  House  to  dine,  and  it  was  one  we  looked  forward 
to  once  a  winter ;  but  dinners  were  too  long  and  heavy, 
and  the  drinking  of  healths,  now  so  happily  abolished, 
was  a  nuisance,  at  least  we  young  ladies  thought  so. 

Mr.  Seward  was  in  the  Senate,  a  youngish  man,  very 
witty  and  very  delightful.  His  great  fame  was  ahead 
of  him,  but  we  of  New  York,  the  Whigs,  were  very  proud 
of  him.  His  head  resembled  that  of  Julius  Caesar  on 
the  coins. 

On  New- Year's  Day  we  went  first  to  the  White  House 
and  then  to  call  on  the  cabinet,  and  sometimes  to 
Arlington  to  call  on  Mr.  Custis.  That  was  a  great  chap- 
ter out  of  history  to  see  for  the  first  time  his  historical 
pictures,  and  to  be  asked  by  his  lovely  and  amiable  wife 


SOCIETY   OF   THE   CAPITAL   HALF   A   CENTURY   AGO  53 

to  drink  tea  out  of  the  Washington  china.  Later  on  I 
used  to  go  there  in  the  spring  over  that  old  Long  Bridge, 
now  happily  replaced  with  iron.  It  looked  as  if  it  would 
break  down,  even  with  our  one  old  hack,  then. 

The  wild  roses,  the  woods  of  Arlington,  even  that 
neglected  tangle  of  a  garden,  were  a  delight  to  me,  and 
Mrs.  Lee  used  to  encourage  my  love  for  the  pink  bonsa- 
line  rosebuds  which  blossomed  all  winter.  Indeed,  I  re- 
member that  once  at  ISTew- Year's  Day  I  plucked  these 
roses  in  the  city  garden  of  Mrs.  S^aton,  and  when  I  was 
there  later,  in  a  snow-storm,  I  wondered  if  the  once  soft, 
Southern  climate  of  Washington  was  one  of  the  vanished 
pleasures  of  youth,  like  a  good  appetite  and  a  love  of 
balls.  Washington  is  a  garden  of  delight  in  spring.  I 
think  Proserpine  sets  her  blessed  foot  here  earlier  and 
more  charmingly  than  anywhere  else;  but  even  in  win- 
ter she  used  to  throw  us  out  a  rose  or  two. 

Such  were  some  of  the  pleasures  of  the  early  Wash- 
ington, the  greatest  of  which  was  to  hear  the  talking. 
A  very  grand  set  of  talkers  were  those  men.  Mr.  Cal- 
houn was  a  most  elegant  conversationalist;  he  talked 
literature,  social  events,  and  even  gossip,  pleasantly. 
All  that  severe  and  almost  iron  logic  of  his  speeches 
melted  away,  and  he  rattled  on  gayly ;  he  liked  to  talk 
to  ladies.  Mr.  Berrian  was  another  finished  talker  when 
conversation  was  an  art.  Mr.  Clay,  the  ugliest  man  in 
the  world,  was  one  of  the  most  fascinating.  He  could 
have  said  with  Wilkes,  "  Give  me  one  hour's  start  and  I 
will  captivate  any  woman  before  the  handsomest  man 
in  England."  He  was  very  gallant,  and  could  make  the 
dullest  dinner  go  off  bravely.  How  near  he  came  to 
being  President,  and  how  wofully  disappointed  were 
he  and  his  friends !  Mr.  Webster,  however,  talked  better 
than  any  of  them,  to  ladies  or  to  anybody. 


54  AN   EPISTLE   TO    POSTERITY 

It  was  a  highly  exciting,  agreeable,  improving  life  for  a 
New  Hampshire  girl.  We  saw  Mr.  Webster  every  day, 
often  dined  with  him,  and  spent  a  winter  at  the  National 
Hotel,  dining  usually  at  a  "mess"  wnth  Mr.  Clay.  I 
saw  General  Taylor  inaugurated,  and  during  the  winter 
of  his  short  reign  saw  much  of  Mrs.  Bliss  at  the  White 
House.  She  made  a  charming  hostess.  We  went  very 
often  to  the  House  and  Senate  in  those  days.  Can  it  be 
possible  that  the  little  room  now  devoted  to  statuary, 
with  its  beautiful  clock,  was  once  that  immense  space  ? 
The  modern  Capitol  confuses  me.  I  feel  at  home  no- 
where except  in  the  rotunda.  Those  stiff  old  pictures 
seem  like  real  friends — something  to  take  hold  of — in 
that  magnificent  bazaar  of  politics.  The  library,  then 
much  smaller  than  now,  Avas  a  great  lounging-place  and 
the  arena  of  flirtation. 

A  wary,  witty  old  gentleman.  General  Greene,  of 
Providence,  and  General  Waddy  Thompson,  of  South 
Carolina — they  were  our  watchdogs.  They  took  turns 
in  mounting  guard;  and  if  there  was  a  fascinating  lieu- 
tenant in  the  navy  or  a  wandering  officer  from  the  plains 
whom  we  wanted  to  meet  in  the  library  they  used  to 
try  and  frustrate  us.  But  we  were  equal  to  the  emer- 
gency, and  I  think  w^e  saw  our  dark-eyed  lieutenants. 

Mr.  Benton — striking  figure,  Avith  his  high  nose  and 
his  recollections — was  a  near  neighbor  of  ours  in  Four- 
and-a-Half  Street.  His  brilliant  daughter,  Mrs.  Fremont, 
had  already  run  away  with  her  lieutenant,  whom  she  so 
adored  all  her  life.  Susan  Benton  was  a  most  brilliant 
woman,  whom  I  saw  afterwards  in  her  pleasant  life  as 
the  wife  of  a  French  minister,  but  destined  to  close  that 
life  under  the  most  cruel  of  misfortunes.  Annie  Wilcox, 
the  beauty,  became  Mrs.  Cabell,  and  died.  "  All,  all  are 
gone,  the  old  familiar  faces."     I  w^ent  to  my  first  grand 


SOCIETY   OF   THE    CAPITAL    HALF   A   CENTURY   AGO         55 

ball  at  Mrs.  Carroll's,  her  beautiful  fair  daughters  being 
the  ornaments  of  the  scene. 

Here  came  General  Scott;  in  those  days  he  was  grandly 
the  hero  of  the  Mexican  war.  Here  I  saw  many  of  the 
young  heroes  destined  later  on  to  be  world-renowned — 
Aclmiral  Farragut  and  Eogers,  young,  handsome,  and 
stately ;  General  Lee,  a  magnificent  man ;  Zachary  Tay- 
lor, Colonel  Bliss,  and  a  little  quiet  man  who  shrank  out 
of  sight — he  was  known  later  on  as  U.  S.  Grant ;  Frank- 
lin and  McClellan,  fresh  from  Mexico,  and  a  thousand 
others  whose  later  fame  has  made  their  early  day  seem 
dim. 

Mr.  Eobert  C.  Winthrop  was  a  prominent  figure.  He 
was  Speaker  of  the  House,  and  much  admired  for  his  ad- 
mirable justice  and  presence  of  mind,  his  fairness  to  his 
political  opponents,  his  fine  temper,  and  his  ready  wit. 
He  was,  like  the  Earl  of  Clarendon,  a  man  with  a  bal- 
ance of  the  qualities,  none  of  them  overweighing  the 
other.  Mr.  Winthrop  was  an  hereditary  gentleman,  a 
man  of  fortune,  entertained  hospitably,  and  was  of  infi- 
nite service  in  the  House  when  passions  ran  high. 

Washington  was  seething  then  with  the  question  of 
abolition  and  "JSTorth  and  South."  The  South  was  very 
much  to  the  front  in  social  as  in  political  matters.  The 
women  were  beautiful,  full  of  all  the  accomplishments, 
and  knowing  how  to  entertain.  The  men,  like  Mr. 
Berrian,  were  scholars  and  most  admirable  talkers. 
Perhaps  we  young  girls,  in  the  flippancy  of  youth, 
found  some  of  them  rather  verbose,  rather  sesquipe- 
dalian, quoting  Pope  more  than  Longfellow,  and  some- 
times the  elderly  ones  would  attempt  an  elephantine 
flirtation.  We  preferred  the  foreign  attaches  and  the 
young  officers  of  the  army  and  navy,  and  I  do  still. 
But  we  had  our  General  Dix,  most  accomplished  of 


56  AN   EPISTLE    TO   POSTERITY 

men — be  who,  for  his  pleasure,  translated  the  Dies  Irce^ 
and  who,  bless  bis  heart !  wrote  that  immortal  line,  bet- 
ter than  poetry,  "  If  any  man  hauls  down  the  Amer- 
ican flag,  shoot  him  on  the  spot."  We  could  brag  of 
Mr.  Winthrop,  who,  one  Southerner  told  me,  was  the 
only  l^orthern  gentleman  he  ever  savv^!  And  at  his 
house  could  be  seen  some  lovely  Boston  girls.  Among 
the  Southern  ladies  I  particularly  remember  the  beau- 
tiful Mrs.  Yulee,  a  soft  Creole  brunette  with  exquisite 
manners.  She  was,  before  her  marriage.  Miss  TVickliffe, 
of  Kentucky,  but  she  had  the  air  of  a  Louisiana  woman. 

Mr.  Morse — Professor  Morse — was  there,  trying  to  get 
an  appropriation  for  a  new  invention,  the  electric  tele- 
graph. I  heard  the  first  click  that  went  through,  either 
to  Baltimore  or  New  York,  I  forget  which.  Just  im- 
agine it!  The  year  1850  was  a  transition  era.  The  old 
was  going  out,  the  new  was  coming  in.  The  looker-on 
little  knew  of  its  importance.  It  is  now  to  me  like 
those  mosaics  at  Eavenna  which  mark  the  Pagan  and 
the  Christian  epoch  as  they  separated. 

As  I  have  visited  the  city  often  since  to  partake  of 
its  elegant  festivities,  to  drive  out  to  the  Soldiers'  Home 
through  palaces  and  flowering  trees,  did  I  ever  regret 
that  old  Washington  ? 

Yes.  It  is  impossible  not  to  regret  the  plain  begin- 
nings and  the  sincere  patriotism,  the  poor  little  homes 
which  held  such  noble  lives ;  and  I  can  safely  affirm  that 
anything  so  delightful  as  Washington  I  have  never  seen 
elsewhere.  There  were  a  mingled  simplicity  and  gran- 
deur, a  mingled  state  and  quiet  intimacy,  a  brilliancy 
of  conversation — the  proud  prominence  of  intellect  over 
material  prosperity  which  does  not  exist  in  any  other 
city  of  the  Union.  I  believe  it  does  not  exist  anywhere 
but  at  Kome,  which  always,  geographically  as  well  as 


SOCIETY  OF  THE  CAPITAL  HALF  A  CENTURY  AGO    57 

politically  and  socially,  reminded  me  so  of  Washington 
that  I  used  to  call  Kome  Washington  inadvertently.  As 
I  was  driving  with  Mrs.  Story  to  the  Pincian  Hill,  I 
w^ould  say,  "  Is  he  in  Washington  ?"  meaning  Rome. 
She  said  I  was  not  the  first  one  who  had  felt  it.  Home, 
like  Washington,  is  small  enough,  quiet  enough,  for 
strong  personal  intimacies ;  Eome,  like  Washington, 
has  its  democratic  court  and  its  entourage  of  diplomatic 
circle;  Rome,  like  Washington,  gives  you  plenty  of 
time  and  plenty  of  sunlight.  I;i  New  York  we  have 
annihilated  both. 

So  my  earl}^  Washington  recollections  became  crystal- 
lized. Cameo-like,  they  stand  out  clear  and  distinct. 
I  see  again  that  great  straggling  outline  so  little  filled 
up,  a  collection  of  houses  here  and  there,  and  then 
great  empty  spaces.  I  see,  in  my  mind's  eye,  the  Capi- 
tol and  the  White  House,  and  the  distant  view  of 
Arlington  and  Georgetown,  almost  a  distant  city.  For 
a  picnic  on  a  June  afternoon  we  would  drive  through 
deserted  lanes  to  Kalorama,  now,  I  believe,  in  the  middle 
of  the  city.  Then  we  had  always  a  delightful  treat 
in  visiting  Brentwood,  at  that  time  kept  up  with  true 
Southern  hospitality;  Silver  Springs,  most  beautiful; 
and  to  Mrs.  Gales's  pretty  cottage.  My  visits  to  the 
Custis  and  Lee  families  at  Arlington  were  frequent  and 
delightful.  It  was  a  consecrated  place  then,  as  now ; 
but  then  there  was  not  between  us  and  General  Wash- 
ington the  unhappy  blood-red  gash  of  civil  war.  I  re- 
gret that  it  was  made  a  graveyard,  that  beautiful  home. 


CHAPTER  IV 

Early  Simplicity  in  Dress  and  Manners — My  Wedding-dress  and  my 
Marriage— A  Novel  "Wedding  Trip— St.  Thomas  and  Santa  Cruz 
— A  Celebrated  Lawsuit  and  a  Unique  Christmas  Festival— Ha- 
vana—  Rachel,  the  famous  French  actress,  visited  the  United 
States  in  1854  —  Fanny  Kemble  —  Thackeray's  Visit  to  America 
— The  Purchase  and  Restoration  of  Mount  Vernon. 

In  the  early  forties  and  fifties  almost  everybody 
"  had  about  enough  to  live  on,"  and  young  ladies  dressed 
well  on  a  hundred  dollars  a  year.  The  daughters  of 
the  richest  man  in  Boston  were  dressed  Avith  scrupulous 
plainness,  and  the  wife  and  mother  owned  one  brocade, 
which  did  service  for  several  years.  Display  was  con- 
sidered vulgar.  Now,  alas !  only  Queen  Victoria  dares 
to  go  shabby;  fine  clothes  have  become  a  necessity 
to  the  lesser  lights.  The  greater  proportion  of  people 
were  happier,  because  there  was  not  such  emulation, 
such  vulgar  striving,  nor  such  soaring,  foolish  ambitions. 
Then  men  and  women  fell  back  on  their  own  minds  for 
'  that  entertainment  which  they  now  seek  in  fast  horses, 
yachts,  great  and  constant  change,  journej^s  to  Europe 
and  to  iN^ewport.  Books  took  the  place  of  dress  and  dis- 
play. When  a  young  lady  was  introduced  into  society 
one  bouquet  did  duty  for  the  seventy-five  which  now 
are  considered  quite  too  few.  There  was  a  sober  ele- 
gance among  even  the  first  in  position  and  the  richest 
in  pocket.  There  was  no  talk  about  money ;  it  has  be- 
come a  subject  of  conversation  since  the  Avar. 

I  was  fortunate  in  being  born  in  that  hour  of  grace 


MY   WEDDING-DRESS  59 

and  brighter  things  which  followed  the  gloomy  Cal- 
vinistic  period.  Several  years  before  I  began  to  observe 
things  Reverend  Lyman  Beecher  had  been  preaching 
violently  against  Unitarianism,  but  about  Boston  that 
gentler  faith  had  permitted  the  young  people  to  dance 
and  to  enjoy  life.  Therefore  I  cannot  say  that  I  suffered 
from  any  Puritan  narrowness,  although  I  heard  the 
echoes  of  it.  The  Puritan  virtues  of  econom}^,  plain 
living,  and  high  thinking  were  everywhere;  yet  there 
were  balls  and  dinners  and  drives  and  picnics,  and 
robust  pleasure  at  Thanksgiving  and  at  Christmas. 
Tinctured  by  the  memories  of  youth,  it  seems  to  me  to 
have  been  a  happy  and  healthful  resting-place  between 
the  religious  gloom  which  had  preceded  it  and  the 
dreadful  sorrows  of  the  war  of  secession  which  followed. 
In  those  early  days  the  dress  of  New  England  girls 
Avas  simple  and  inexpensive,  often  white  in  summer  and 
dark  merino  in  winter,  and  perhaps  one  silk  dress  for 
great  occasions.  But  there  was  one  dress  which  was 
always  handsome,  and  that  was  the  wedding-dress. 
Perhaps  for  that  reason,  or  a  better  one,  I  wrote  the 
following  letter  to  a  friend : 

''Nov.  11,  185— 
"Dear  L., — I  am  to  be  married  to-morrow,  and  have  just  been  re- 
hearsing the  ceremony  in  the  front  parlor  in  my  wedding-dress.  It 
is  a  beauty,  made  with  a  low  waist,  pointed  before  and  in  the  back, 
where  it  is  laced  ;  a  deep  Brussels  lace  berthe  trims  the  neck.  The 
sleeves  are  short  and  tight,  the  skirt  very  full  and  plaited  into  a  belt. 
It  is  made  of  white  moire  antique,  so  stiff  it  w^ould  stand  alone.  I 
have  a  wreath  of  orange  blossoms,  with  long,  flowing  garlands  at 
the  back,  and  a  white  tulle  veil,  cut  like  a  cloak,  with  a  point  of  lace 
a  la  Marie  Stuart  coming  down  to  the  forehead.  This  is  very  becom- 
ing. White  satin  slippers  and  white  gloves.  My  two  bridesmaids  have 
deep-pink  flounced  grenadine  dresses  over  pink  silk,  with  garlands  of 
pink  acacias,  which  make  Annie  look  like  a  dream.  Mr.  Sherwood  has 
a  deep-mulberry  dress-coat  with  steel  buttons,  and  a  white  silk  vest;  it 


60  AN   EPISTLE    TO    POSTEEITY 

is  very  handsome.  I  hope  the  gentlemen  will  keep  to  this  fashion. 
[This  was  a  fashion  introduced  by  the  Prince  Consort,  and  it  was  very 
handsome,  but  it  did  not  last  long;  the  gloomy  clawhammer  soon  dis- 
placed it.  It  was  attempted  again  in  1870,  but  was  blotted  out.] 
Bishop  Chase,  of  New  Hampshire,  is  to  perform  the  ceremony,  and  is 
here  to-night  with  us,  as  are  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Sherwood,  Mary  Bostwick, 
Mary  Sherwood,  and  David  Golden  Murray,  Robert  Sherwood,  and 
Thaddeus  Lane.  Our  house  is  full,  and  Roxana  and  her  assistants  are 
in  great  feather  getting  up  feasts.  We  are  to  be  married  at  twelve 
o'clock,  and  at  two  leave  for  Mount  Vernon  and  New  York  via 
Springfield.     And  perhaps  we  shall  reach  the  Mammoth  Cave. 

"  For  our  real  wedding  journey,  however,  John  will  take  me  to  the 
West  Indies,  where  he  has  an  important  lawsuit  to  take  care  of.  Is 
not  that  a  most  original,  delightful  programme  ?  Who  ever  went  to 
the  West  Indies  before  on  a  bridal  tour  ?  We  hope  you  will  come  to 
our  wedding  reception  in  New  York.    It  will  be  on  December  1,  just 

before  we  sail.     Etc.,  etc. 

"Ever  thine,  M.  E." 

A  light  fall  of  snow  through  which  the  sun  shone 
lighted  up  the  morning  hour.  Dr.  Ingersoll,  a  dear  and 
witty  friend,  said,  "  I^ature  has  paid  you  the  prettiest 
of  compliments ;  she  has  put  on  a  wedding- veil." 

We  went  on  the  8th  of  December  to  Bermuda  by  a 
little  propeller  which  was  the  most  uncomfortable  craft 
I  ever  have  sailed  on.  It  was  called  the  Merlin^  but 
had  left  all  enchantment  behind.  The  smell  of  the  gal- 
ley came  aft,  freighted  with  the  odor  of  roasted  onions. 
On  board  were  many  residents  of  those  islands  going 
home  after  a  summer  in  the  States,  and  with  one  of  them 
we  formed  a  friendship  destined  to  have  a  most  benefi- 
cial result  on  our  winter's  residence  in  Santa  Cruz.  This 
was  the  Keverend  Mr.  Hawley,  the  rector  of  the  church 
at  Bassin,  w^ho  asked  us  to  share  his  house  there,  as  the 
hotel  was  most  primitive,  and  we  did  so  gladly,  later  on. 

Bermuda  is  beautiful,  with  its  turquoise  waters,  its 
oleander-trees,  its  white  cottages  of  stone  with  yellow 
roofs,  and   its   swell  English  regiment,  its  lihes,  and 


A   NOVEL  WEDDING   TRIP  61 

boundless  waters,  "  the  still  vexed  Bermoothes."  Since 
those  days  it  has  become  a  fashionable  watering-place, 
with  grand  hotels.  Then  it  had  but  one  little  boarding- 
house,  where  we  got  a  respectable  dinner. 

But  its  beauty  is  its  own ;  it  was  always  unique.  The 
one  day's  experience  and  a  drive  to  St.  George  was  all 
that  was  allowed  us,  and  we  were  soon  at  sea  again. 

The  planters  and  their  families  proved  very  agreeable 
travelling  companions,  although  they  all  talked  ruin. 
They  were  principally  from  the-  Danish  islands,  St. 
Thomas  and  Santa  Cruz,  and  were  never  tired  of  telling 
how  the  Danish  governor,  Yan  Scholten,  had  issued  an 
edict  freeing  the  slaves,  and  had  then  sailed  off  to  Den- 
mark in  time  to  escape  the  riot,  the  bloodshed,  and  the 
confusion  of  his  act.  "  In  fact,"  said  my  infuriated  in- 
formant, "3^ou  will  see  plenty  of  ruin.  England  has  neg- 
lected and  ruined  Jamaica,  revolution  and  bad  govern- 
ment have  ruined  Hayti,  emancipation  and  Denmark 
have  ruined  Santa  Cruz,  and  Spain  has  ruined  Cuba," 
and  so  on,  and  so  on. 

'' But  you  still  have  flowers?"  I  asked. 

"  Oh  yes,  plenty  of  flowers,  and  we  can  give  you  a 
good  dinner  and  show  you  a  few  of  Thorwaldsen's 
statues.  And  you  will  see  neglected  fields,  tumble- 
down properties,  looking-glasses  cracked  and  boarded 
up,  windows  broken,  etc.  Losing  our  slave  labor,  we 
are  all  poor,  poor,  poor,"  etc.,  etc.,  ad  infinitum. 

When  we  reached  the  picturesque  harbor  of  St. 
Thomas,  and,  looking  up  a  steep  mountain  like  Vesuvius, 
saw  the  little  town  of  Charlotte  Amalie  hanging  in  air, 
with  palaces  and  flowering  trees  everywhere,  we  were 
so  delighted  that  I  lost  all  sense  of  ruin.  My  gloomy 
planter,  coming  up  in  a  suit  of  white  duck,  was  more 
cheerful,  and  watched  for  his  little  schooner,  which  was 


62  AN   EPISTLE    TO   POSTERITY 

to  take  him  to  Santa  Cruz,  twenty  miles  away.  "We  were 
to  go  to  the  hotel  and  spend  a  week  in  "St.  Thomas  be- 
fore we  sailed  over  to  Santa  Cruz. 

A  famously  good  French  table  we  found,  and  the  het- 
erogeneous company  of  all  the  islands  joined  in  this  ho- 
tel, which  from  its  piazza  commanded  a  splendid  view. 
The  thermometer  stood  at  88°,  although  it  was  Decem- 
ber. ISTear  us  at  dinner  sat  Father  Ambrosius,  a  most 
celebrated  Catholic  priest,  who  had  been  on  the  Merlin. 
Father  Ambrosius  had  been  suflSciently  human  to  talk 
to  the  young  bride  of  subjects  in  which  she  then  took  a 
decided  interest,  and  perhaps  does  yet. 

Amid  those  tropical  seas  and  lustrous  stars  and  those 
soft  breezes,  on  whose  wings  fly  delicate  love  fancies 
and  tender  dreams,  the  old  monk  had  talked  to  us  of  the 
Proven 9al  poetry,  of  Petrarch,  of  Clemence  Isaure  and 
the  violet,  of  old  Spanish  romance,  and  of  modern 
French  romance  and  poetr3^  He  had  all  Petrarch's  son- 
nets at  his  tongue's  end.  No  two  young  married  lovers 
had  ever  a  better  companion.  Even  at  the  dinner  he 
proved  himself  a  gourmet,  was  a  capital  judge  of  wines, 
and  told  us  what  to  eat  and  what  to  avoid ;  he  even 
told  us  who  lyeople  were— ^xxQh  as  the  old  sun-dried  bank- 
er, the  Danish  Councillor  Feddustal,  the  Danish  beauty 
Miss  Stridiron,  etc.  After  dinner  he  sat  out  with  us  on 
the  balcony,  looking  at  the  unlimited  reach  of  ocean 
and  the  calm,  splendid,  brilliantly  illuminated  heaven. 
Yenus  seemed  to  hang  down  by  an  invisible  thread,  and 
she  caused  the  palm-trees  to  cast  a  visible  shadow ;  she 
glowed  with  such  pale,  intense  fire  in  that  clear  air  that 
the  earth  was  filled  with  her  radiance.  He  knew  his 
classics  as  well  as  his  breviary ;  he  knew  even  human 
nature;  he  knew  literature;  he  had  taste  and  intelli- 
gence— in  fact,  we  always  wished  that  we  could  have 


MY    FIRST    WEST   INDIA   DINNEK  68 

taken  Father  Ambrosius,  brown  capuchin,  rope  round  the 
waist,  shaved  head  and  all,  along  with  us  through  life. 

The  next  day,  at  his  suggestion,  we  had  mounted  two 
little  Spanish  jennets  and  rode  up  the  Sugar-loaf  to  see 
more  of  the  view.  I  believe  nothing  finer  exists  than 
this  sudden  elevation  out  of  the  blue  sea,  St.  Thomas,  W.  I. 

On  the  following  day  we  were  asked  to  dine  with  the 
old  banker,  to  whom  my  husband  had  brought  letters  of 
credit,  and  to  whom  w^as  consigned  a  very  large  sum  of 
money  which  was  to  settle  the  claims  of  one  Anna  Ma- 
ria Sparks  to  the  estate  in  San  Francisco  owned  by  her 
son,  one  Leidesdorf,  and  bought  by  one  Captain  Folsom. 
I  shall  have  more  to  say  of  this  romantic  story  later 
on.  As  it  was,  I  picture  myself  dressed  in  an  India 
muslin  and  going  down  to  my  first  West  India  dinner. 
The  change  from  the  propeller  was  delightful.  The  ther- 
mometer was  up  among  the  nineties,  and  yet  the  English- 
men present  were  in  the  orthodox  black  coat  and  trousers, 
and  the  two  American  officers  were  sweltering  in  their 
fine  naval  uniforms  and  stiff  embroidered  collars  (one  of 
them,  who  was  very  fat,  said  in  my  ear,  with  a  good- 
natured  smile,  "  You  know  how  uniforms  shrink  ").  The 
Americans  present  were  in  Avhite-duck  pantaloons  and 
black  dress-coats,  the  only  ones  who  dared  to  difi'er  from 
the  English  regard  for  les  convenances  (and  I  am  not  sure 
they  were  much  cooler).  Several  ladies  were  present,  and 
the  dinner  was  admirable — a  w^ ell-seasoned  soup,  a  fish 
called  the  barracouta,  an  excellent  entree^  a  pair  of  guinea- 
fowls,  roast  mutton,  a  salad  of  green  peppers  and  toma- 
toes, well  dressed;  and,  what  was  more  important  to  the 
gentlemen,  good  old  Madeira  which  had  travelled  far, 
Tinto  which  was  fresh  from  Spain,  clarets  as  good  as 
when  they  first  left  France,  and  Burgundy  a  trifle  better. 

After  the  dinner  was  finished  our  host,  the  banker, 


64  AN   EPISTLE  TO   POSTERITY 

arose  and,  stretching  out  his  hand  to  me,  said,  "  Welbe- 
TtomerP  This  custom  went  around  the  table.  It  seems 
it  is  a  Danish  word  signifying  "  Welcome,"  "  Your  good 
health,"  "May  your  dinner  agree  with  you." 

I  retired  with  the  Danish  ladies,  all  of  whom  spoke 
English,  and  I  asked  them  how  they  spent  their  lives. 

"  Oh,  we  rise  early,  go  out  on  horseback,  come  back, 
take  a  siesta,  and  dress  for  an  eleven-o'clock  breakfast, 
then  lounge  and  read  or  do  embroidery ;  then  we  lunch 
at  two,  take  another  siesta,  drive  at  five,  to  get  the  ocean 
breeze,  and  dine  at  eight — a  busy,  uninteresting,  sleepy 
life,"  said  Miss  Sigenbrod,  a  pale  Danish  beauty.  But 
she  sat  down  at  the  piano  and  played  with  great  vigor. 
The  Danes,  men  and  women,  are  consummate  musicians 
— a  great  resource  in  that  sleepy  island.  The  gentlemen 
finally  got  through  with  their  cigars,  wine-and-water, 
Peter  Herring  brandy,  and  cordials,  and  came  in  to  join 
us.  Our  host,  hospitable  to  the  last,  offered  us  ladies 
aerated  waters,  as  we  did  not  take  the  heavier  drinks ; 
but  what  would  I  not  have  given  for  one  glass  of  ice- 
water  ! — a  luxury  I  was  not  destined  to  taste  in  three 
months,  for  all  the  cooling  which  drinking-water  gets 
in  these  remote  islands  is  to  hang  it  in  a  porous  jar 
in  the  breeze,  which  I  thought  made  it  more  tepid  and 
more  tasteless  than  before.  But  I  could  talk  of  my 
ride  on  a  Spanish  jennet,  a  pacing  pony  which  is  nearer 
to  being  a  rocking-chair  than  any  horseback  motion  I 
have  ever  tried.  J^o  carriages  would  be  of  service  on 
that  sugar  -  loaf  which  St.  Thomas  is,  so  we  did  all  our 
sight-seeing  from  the  ponies'  backs. 

"Well, how  did  you  enjoy  your  dinner?"  asked  my 
husband,  as  we  regained  our  own  rooms  in  the  hotel. 

"  Oh,  immensely !"  said  I.  "  I  should  like  to  live  here 
forever." 


A  WEST   INDIAN   EESIDENCE  65 

I  have  been  glad  since  that  he  was  not  of  my  opinion. 

We  left  on  a  little  schooner  for  Santa  Cruz  in  a 
week.  It  was  a  short  sail  and  uneventful.  Our  friend 
the  Keverend  Mr.  Hawley  received  us  at  the  wharf 
with  his  carriage  in  waiting,  drove  us  to  his  house, 
and  gave  us  afternoon  tea  on  a-  shaded  veranda  which 
looked  into  a  garden.  And  afterwards  we  sauntered 
down  long  avenues  which  were  thickly  shaded  by 
polished -leaved  orange- trees,  the  Olea  fragrans,  and 
the  innumerable  blooming  trees  of  this  famed  island. 
These  alleys  radiated  in  fan  shape  from  the  house. 
Along  one,  lovely  scarlet  pendent  blossoms  lighted  up 
the  green ;  in  another,  yellow  tassels  hung  gracefully ;  in 
another,  pink  blossoms  blushed.  Down  another  alley 
white  flowers  gleamed  like  stars ;  the  banana,  the  pine- 
apple, the  orange,  the  guava,  the  lemon,  all  planted  at 
intervals ;  and  over  the  pretty  shaded  portico  hung  the 
passion-flower  vine,  heavy  with  symbolic  blossoms  and 
its  fruit,  the  queer  pear-shaped  papaw. 

I  could  not  express  my  ecstatic  delight;  nor  was  this 
delight  ever  satiated.  Never,  except  in  Italy,  have  I 
seen  anything  more  lovely.  Miss  Ballin,  a  colored  house- 
keeper, of  excellent  manners,  showed  me  to  my  room,  and 
I  found  no  glass  windows — there  is  not  a  pane  of  glass 
in  Santa  Cruz ;  a  bed  with  one  linen  sheet  over  the  hard 
mattress,  a  pillow,  a  mosquito-net,  two  chairs,  a  dressing- 
table,  and  a  wash-stand,  voild  tout !  Seeing  me  look  as- 
kance at  the  bed,  she  said,  "If  madame  should  wish  anoth- 
er sheet  I  will  give  her  a  square  of  mosquito-netting." 

And  that  was  all  I  had  during  six  weeks.  It  was  all 
I  needed ;  but  the  great  trouble  was  to  get  a  bath-tub 
and  enough  water. 

The  mosquitoes  troubled  me  when  I  sat  on  the  ve- 
randa, so  I  soon  got  to  pass  ray  days  in  a  long,  low,  beau- 


66  AN   EPISTLE    TO    POSTERITY 

tif ul  room  down-stairs,  which  had  a  marble  floor  and  was 
carefully  mosquito-netted  against  the  enemy.  I  found 
that  silk  stockings  and  low  slippers  must  be  abandoned 
and  thick  boots  substituted,  else  these  ferocious  biters 
would  eat  me  up.  I  got  to  like  Miss  Ballin's  dinners, 
heavily  freighted  with  red  pepper  though  they  were ; 
they  were  savory,  and  a  certain  pastry  called  guava- 
berry  tart  was  highly  appreciated. 

"  Christmas  will  come  day  after  to-morrow,"  said  Mr. 
Hawley,  one  evening,  "  and  I  wish  to  appropriate  Mrs. 
Sherwood's  day."  He  told  us  that  we  were  to  dine 
with  him  at  Mrs.  Abbot's,  where  we  should  see  the  true 
elegance  and  hospitality  of  the  island.  Mrs.  Abbot  had 
been  twice  married,  her  first  husband  having  been  Cap- 
tain Blakeley,  of  our  navy,  of  distinguished  fame.  His 
daughter  had  been  a  ward  of  the  United  States,  and 
after  her  mother's  second  marriage  she  had  come  to 
these  islands,  married,  and  had  died.  Mrs.  Abbot  had, 
however,  other  sons  and  daughters,  and  with  her  broth- 
ers and  sisters,  was  rather  the  queen  of  Bassin. 

"  But  first  I  wish  you  to  go  with  me  to  early  church, 
and  see  me  administer  the  communion  to  eight  hundred 
negroes,"  said  this  dear,  good,  faithful  rector.  This  ex- 
cellent man  had  me  called  at  six,  and  I  went  with  him 
through  the  glory  of  the  tropical  morning,  through  the 
churchyard  filled  with  the  works  of  Thorwaldsen.  The 
little  grave  of  one  little  child  had  been  marked  by  a 
butterfly,  and  this  work  of  Thorwaldsen's  skilful  fingers 
was  doubly  beautiful,  in  that  the  damp  sea  air  had  fret- 
ted the  wings  of  the  butterfly  until  they  were  diapha- 
nous. We  came  to  the  church,  already  half  filled  with 
the  black  women  in  their  white  turbans  and  gowns, 
the  black  men  decently  dressed  for  church,  all  stand- 
ing awaiting  that  blessed  hospitality  which  had  said 


CHRISTMAS-DAY    IN    THE   TROPICS  67 

to  them  as  to  us,  "Eat,  drink,  in  remembrance  of 
Me." 

The  clerk  introduced  them  all  to  the  clergyman,  say- 
ing, "  Diana  and  CaBsar,  estate  Diamond  and  Euby '' ; 
"  Clio  and  Manuel,  estate  Mon  Bijou,"  before  they  took 
the  cup.  This  was  necessary,  as  Mr.  Hawley  could  not 
remember  them  all. 

That  was  the  only  thing  which  remained  to  remind 
one  that  they  had  so  recently  been  chattels. 

It  was  a  long  service,  that  of  Christmas-day,  for  at 
eleven  o'clock  arrived  the  planters  and  their  families, 
many  of  whom  kindly  called  on  us  afterwards  at  the 
rectory.  Among  those  was  Mr.  Randolph,  an  English- 
man, who  asked  us  to  dine  with  him  at  Mon  Bijou,  his 
pretty  place  seven  miles  away.  My  husband  went  off 
with  him  to  call  on  the  governor  and  some  of  the  otlier 
dignitaries,  and  on  old  Judge  Feddersen,  who  held  the 
fort  for  Anna  Maria  Sparks  in  the  Captain  Folsom  case. 

I  was  very  glad  to  retreat  to  the  mosquito-net  and  the 
one  linen  sheet  and  to  fan  myself  into  a  siesta.  I  rose  at 
seven  reluctantly  to  dress,  and  at  eight  o'clock  we  drove 
to  Mrs.  Abbot's,  where  we  found  a  large  party.  Mrs. 
Abbot  was  a  lady  of  high  degree ;  her  manners  had  the 
majesty  of  a  past  age.  Councillor  Feddustal,  a  very 
distinguished  person,  stood  near  her.  The  governor  and 
his  wife,  evidently  people  of  the  world ;  Miss  Sigenbrod, 
Misses  Stridiron,  Miss  Feddersen,  Danish  beauties ;  Miss 
Abbot,  a  gentle  blonde,  and  some  fine-looking  old  gen- 
tlemen in  uniforms,  made  up  a  distinguished  party  of 
twenty-four  people. 

There  seemed  to  be  a  white-haired  negro  behind  each 
chair.  The  long  table  was  illuminated  with  wax-candles 
in  tall  glass  globes  which  defended  their  flickering  light 
from  the  insects  and  from  draughts.     The  table  was 


68  AN    EPISTLE   TO   POSTEEITY 

loaded  with  flowers  and  most  delicious  fruits,  with  heavy 
old-fashioned  silver-plate  and  china,  all  of  which  had 
been  curious  and  valuable  for  naore  than  a  hundred 
years.  The  viands  were  savory  and  well  cooked.  My 
husband  had  the  honor  to  sit  next  Mrs.  Abbot,  and  I 
soon  saw  them  looking  at  me  and  pointing  to  a  picture 
on  the  wall.  As  I  looked  at  it  I  noticed  that  it  was 
like  my  mother  and  my  sisters,  and  that  the  lady  was 
dressed  as  I  was,  in  yellow.  In  fact,  it  happened  to 
bear  a  singular  resemblance  to  me.  Mrs.  Abbot  was 
much  aifected  by  it,  and  as  this  was  a  picture  of  her  de- 
ceased daughter  it  became  a  very  intimate  bond  between 
us,  and  led  to  a  thousand  kindnesses  on  her  part  tow- 
ards the  stranger. 

The  hour  of  toasts  arrived,  and  the  clergyman  arose 
and  drank  "To  the  roof^''  always  the  first  toast;  then 
"  His  Majesty  the  King  "  ;  then  "  To  our  absent  friends, 
God  bless  them !"  drunk  standing ;  "  To  our  friendly 
allies,  Europe  and  America  "  (rather  patronizingly) ;  and, 
finally,  "  To  the  bride  and  groom,"  at  which  my  next 
neighbor  threw  his  glass  over  his  shoulder  and  broke  it 
in  my  honor. 

Then  rising,  each  shook  hands  with  the  other,  ex- 
claimed "  Welbelcomer P''  and  we  ladies  retired,  leaving 
the  gentlemen  to  cigars  and  rum-and-water. 

After  Miss  Sigenbrod  had  dashed  off  a  superb  sonata 
on  the  piano,  Mrs.  Abbot  sat  down  by  me  and  put  her 
sweet  old  hand  in  mine,  telling  me  how  I  reminded  her 
of  her  lost  daughter.  "  There  is  her  picture  by  Sully,  of 
Philadelphia,"  said  she;  " it  might  be  a  picture  of  you." 
She  asked  me  to  come  next  week.  King's  Day,  and  see 
the  people  dance.  "  Our  people  [meaning  the  negroes] 
come  in  from  the  plantations  and  sing  their  old  African 
melodies,  and  play  the  drum  and  dance ;  it  is  a  wild 


i 


VISITS  MADE   IN   SANTA   OBUZ  69 

scene,  one  that  strangers  never  forget.  We  have  an 
African  prince  named  Manuel,  who  was  brought  here 
when  he  was  a  boy.  He  was  very  unruly,  but  kindness 
has  tamed  him." 

So  I  saw  Manuel,  the  African  prince,  and  many 
another  with  the  original  brand  of  the  slave-ships  on 
their  foreheads,  and  they  played  the  rude  drum  (which 
was  a  skin  pulled  over  the  head  of  a  barrel)  with  their 
thumbs,  as  they  sang  a  monotonous  chant  in  the  minor 
key  (all  savage  music  is  in  the  ipinor  key,  and  is  pro- 
foundly sad,  never  joyous);  and  they  danced,  wildly, 
savagely — as  a  bird  might  fly,  with  one  of  its  ^vings 
broken. 

Our  next  expedition  was  to  the  house  of  an  old  Scotch 
knight,  Sir  Matthew  Macdonald,  whose  house  command- 
ed a  splendid  view.  We  found  the  old  man  of  scientific 
attainments  at  his  post  of  observation,  noting  barometers 
and  thermometers  and  ^N'ature  generally. 

Two  naval  officers  were  of  our  party;  their  ship,  a 
fine  man-of-war  flying  the  Stars  and  Stripes,  lay  in 
the  harbor.  Sir  Matthew  showed  great  interest  in  these, 
and  opened  a  musty  yellow  volume  in  which  he  recorded 
the  name,  tonnage,  number  of  guns,  etc. 

"  This  I  have  done  for  fifty  years,"  said  the  old  gentle- 
man. "  My  interest  in  this  world  is  bounded  by  what 
comes  into  these  seas  which  lie  under  my  eyes — by  Nat- 
ure, Avhich  lies  all  about  me,  and  the  heavens  above  me. 
I  do  not  care  for  society,  for  politics,  for  the  perform- 
ance of  man  in  the  theatre  of  this  world.  So  lonor  as 
friends  choose  to  come  to  me  here,  they  are  welcome ;  I 
go  nowhere.  It  may  be  a  selfish  existence,  but  to  me 
it  is  a  happy  one,  and  it  hurts  no  one."  After  taking 
coffee  with  Lady  Macdonald,  Sir  Matthew  led  us  into  a 
ruined,  desolated  wino^  of  his  house  to  show  us  the  rav- 


70  AN   EPISTLE   TO   POSTERITY 

ages  of  the  ants.  They  had  eaten  away  the  whole  in- 
terior of  the  wood  which  had  supported  his  astronomical 
instruments,  and  he  had  these  mounted  on  iron  plough- 
shares and  broken  bits  of  sugar-boilers.  We  often  heard 
these  ant  ravages  alluded  to,  and  afterwards  we  saw  a 
colony  of  them  deliberately  strip  oif  their  wings  and 
worm  their  way  into  a  wooden  wall  in  Mr.  Hawley's 
house.  Sometimes  the  leg  of  a  table  would  go  down 
unexpectedly  and  reveal  a  hollow  inside  r  they  had  en- 
tirely eaten  out  the  heart  of  the  wood. 

Most  of  the  houses  at  which  we  visited  were  monu- 
ments of  past  prosperity,  where  poverty  was  bravely 
and  silently  borne.  They  were,  many  of  them,  full  of 
learning  and  refinement,  full  of  dramatic  secrets.  It  was 
the  veriest  atmosphere  for  the  novelist.  No  one  knew 
anything  about  Time.  He  had  never  crossed  over  from 
St.  Thomas,  the  old  thief  Time !  Having  no  seasons, 
it  was  always  summer — "sacred,  high,  eternal  noon." 
These  West-Indians  never  said  "last  autumn,"  "last  win- 
ter." They  had  none  of  these  reminders ;  so  the  growth 
of  children  was  their  only  calendar.  Their  newspapers 
were  a  fortnight  old,  and  nobody  read  them  but  the 
planters,  and  they  not  often.  A  newspaper  is  of  no  in- 
terest unless  you  read  one  every  day.  One  must  keep 
hold  of  Time. 

The  day  came  when  we  were  to  dine  at  Mr.  Kan- 
dolph's,  and  the  rich  English  planter  received  us  in  a 
beautiful,  well-kept  house.  Fortune  had  not  gone  hard 
with  him.  We  drove  thither  by  the  sea  over  one  or  two 
gentle  elevations,  seeing  St.  Thomas  and  Porto  Kico — 
very  dimly  the  last,  but  dreamy  and  delicious.  The 
plantations  looked,  each  with  its  negro  huts  about  it, 
like  little  towns ;  and  the  long,  smooth,  white  roads, 
planted  with  palm-trees  like  long  zones  of  umbrellas, 


71 

had  a  pretty  effect.  But  palms  are  not  half  so  beautiful 
as  elms.     In  a  landscape  they  are  ineffective. 

Mr.  Randolph  lived  like  an  English  nobleman,  but  he 
was  no  more  cheerful  than  the  rest  of  them.  He  knew 
how  to  give  a  dinner.  London  could  not  have  given  us 
a  better  one.  People  who  live  in  quiet,  remote  places 
are  apt  to  give  good  dinners.  They  are  the  oft-recurring 
excitement  of  an  otherwise  unemotional,  dull  existence. 
They  linger,  each  of  these  dinners,  in  our  palimpsest  mem- 
ories, each  recorded  clearly,  so  that  it  does  not  blot  out 
the  other.  Mr.  Randolph  had  travelled  extensively.  He 
was  a  "  London  swell "  condemned  to  an  existence  in 
this  remote  corner.  But  then  he  had  a  French  cook 
from  the  "  Trois  Freres  Proven^aux,"  a  keenly  devel- 
oped sense  of  gastronomy,  and  plenty  of  money.  Given 
these  three  things,  "  avec  cette  sauce,"  and  one  could 
give  a  dinner  in  the  desert. 

"  Oh,  what  a  good  dinner  we  have  eaten,  and  what  ci- 
gars we  are  smoking !"  whispered  my  husband  to  me  as 
he  came  in  furtively  to  bring  me  my  fan  and  handker- 
chief ;  and  then  he  returned  to  the  moonlighted  veranda, 
in  the  shade,  to  look  at  the  tropical  night  and  to  imbibe 
the  fine  old  Santa  Cruz  rum  and  water.  The  time 
came  for  us  to  depart,  and  we  drove  home  in  the  tropical 
moonlight,  my  husband  holding  a  parasol  over  my  head 
— in  that  superb  moonlight,  so  soft  and  clear.  Why? 
Randolph  had  told  him  to  do  so,  he  said,  else  I  should 
have  a  swollen  face,  which  would  not  become  a  bride. 

"  Randolph  thinks  the  moon  particularly  dangerous, 
not  only  to  one's  brain,  but  to  one's  personal  beauty," 
said  he;  "and  what  stories  they  tell  of  centipeds  and 
the  poison  fish,  the  barracouta  and  the  moon !" 

Our  next  fine  dinner  was  at  Government  House. 
There  we  had  an  exact  copy  of  what  such  a  feast  would 


72  AN   EPISTLE  TO   POSTERITY 

be  at  Copenhagen,  and  it  was  very  stately.  As  we  got 
talking  music  during  the  charming  dessert,  his  Excel- 
lency promised  to  play  for  us  afterwards  on  the  piano 
some  works  of  a  Danish  composer.  I  found  out  that 
he  was  an  ardent  admirer  and  pupil  of  Kubinstein, 
and  that  he  himself  was  the  composer.  How  rarely,  I 
thought,  shall  I  find  a  governor  who  will  play  the  piano 
like  this  for  me  ! 

"  Much  talk  of  Bulasminda  after  you  left  the  table," 
said  my  husband  to  me.  "  It  is  the  old  residence  of  the 
late  governor,  Yan  Scholten.  The  present  governor  of- 
fered it  to  us,  if  we  wish  to  take  it,  for  almost  nothing. 
It  stands  there  furnished,  and  with  a  corps  of  accom- 
plished servants  ready  at  your  hand.  Moreover,  he  and 
his  delightful  wife  will  call  for  us  and  take  us  for  a  drive 
and  lunch  at  Bulasminda  to-morrow." 

Bulasminda  was  on  a  height  far  above  the  city  of 
Ballin,  and  commanded  the  view  and  the  sea-breeze  so 
coveted  in  these  islands ;  here  were  great  breezy  salons 
and  broad  verandas,  and  cozy  little  charming  boudoirs 
furnished  with  bright  chintz.  From  the  telescopes  along 
the  veranda  one  could  but  fear  that  Governor  Yan  Schol- 
ten had  sat  looking  out  to  sea,  for  the  best  part  of  his 
occupancy,  to  sight  the  vessel  which  should  bear  him 
away.  There  was  his  journal  on  the  table,  like  Kobinson 
Crusoe's  notched  sticks : 

**  Calypso  sighted  this  morniDg. 

"  Ariel  weighed  anchor  at  seven  last  evening. 

**  Christian  the  Eleventh  sailed  to-day. 

"Schooner  Gustamis  arrived, 

"American  man-of-war  Lancaster  in  the  harbor. 

"English  steamer  Trent  expected,"  etc. 

The  perpetual  summer  of  the  tropics  had  evidently 
not  enchanted  Governor  Yan  Scholten. 


A   FAMOUS   LAW-SUIT  73 

We  were  asked  by  the  steward  to  put  our  names  in 
this  book,  but  as  we  were  not  a  steamship,  nor  even  a 
schooner,  we  hesitated.  After  luncheon  our  hospitable 
hosts  showed  us  the  house ;  it  was  vastly  convenient,  but 
we  did  not  take  it,  not  even  for  a  week. 

The  busy  and  hard-working  young  lawyer  had  not 
forgotten  his  business.  The  case  at  which  he  worked 
several  hours  a  day  was  this:  A  certain  half- negro, 
half -Dane  sea-captain  named  Leidesdorf  had  done  so 
good  a  business  between  St.  Thomas  and  San  Francisco 
in  the  early  forties  that  he  had  made  money.  He  had 
the  good-luck  to  be  in  San  Francisco  when  gold  was 
discovered,  and  came  to  own  a  piece  of  ground  in  the 
then  small  town  which  struck  the  fancy  of  one  of  the 
"Argonauts  of  '49."  Sea -Captain  Leidesdorf  prom- 
ised to  sell  this  piece  of  land  to  Captain  Folsom  for  a 
certain  sum,  and  was  paid  that  money,  but  he  started 
home  in  his  ship  for  St.  Thomas  before  the  transaction 
was  completed,  and  died  just  before  landing. 

Hence  confusion  and  New  York  lawyers.  His  old 
mother,  Anna  Maria  Sparks,  who  could  neither  read  nor 
write,  demanded  boxes  of  jewels  and  barrels  of  gold. 
The  price  had  gone  up  every  hour  since  Captain  Folsom 
made  the  first  treaty.  Should  she  allow  her  son's  great 
fortune  to  escape  her?  A  shrewd  old  Danish  lawyer. 
Judge  Feddersen,  said  no.  So  poor  Captain  Folsom  kept 
paying  and  paying,  and  other  heirs  sprang  up.  My 
husband  had  been  twice  to  Santa  Cruz  before  on  this 
business ;  I  only  came  in  at  the  finish.  Finally,  one  pay- 
ment remained,  and  he  said  that  I  might  see  that ;  so  he 
drove  me  up  a  hill  to  a  humble  shanty  where  sat  a 
drunken  Danish  soldier  on  a  three-legged  stool  awaiting 
his  share,  and  it  was  paid  to  him — $20,000  in  gold.  He 
was  not  a  Populist  or  a  Silverite;  he  distrusted  paper, 


74  AN   EPISTLE   TO   POSTERITY 

and  he  would  have  none  of  his  own  depreciated  Danish 
coin ;  so  a  little  bag  of  gold  was  produced,  and  he  was 
paid  in  the  presence  of  Judge  Feddersen  and  the  clerk 
of  the  bank,  while  my  husband  did  the  legal  business 
and  took  the  receipt.  I  remember  exactly  how  this 
Danish  soldier  cramped  himself  up  to  write  his  name, 
"  Holder  Guindrop " — I  can  see  that  autograph  now. 
We  then  left  him  with  his  gold.  He  was  a  brother-in-law 
of  the  late  Captain  Leidesdorf,  and  he  drank  himself  to 
death  in  three  months  out  of  his  bag  of  gold. 

When  we  came  back  to  New  York  Captain  Folsom 
called  to  see  us — a  pale,  resolute  man,  very  embittered  and 
disappointed.  He  had  fought  with  wild  beasts  at  Ephe- 
sus  for  his  land,  and  said  that  he  had  paid  old  Anna 
Maria  Sparks  $200,000  too  much.  He  died  soon  after, 
and  the  distinguished  firm  of  Halleck,  Peachy  &  Bil- 
lings took  care  of  his  affairs ;  this  was  the  last  little  leaf 
of  romance  which  came  to  me  with  my  wedding  journey. 

We  left  Santa  Cruz  and  our  dear,  hospitable  friends, 
our  kind  Mr.  Hawley,  and  the  unique  days  we  passed 
there  with  great  regret.  I  often  see  in  my  dreams  that 
flower-laden  porch,  the  lovely  view  from  Bulasminda, 
and  during  Christmas  week  I  always  hear  that  monoto- 
nous droning  sound;  I  see  the  negroes  advancing,  singing 
that  melancholy  ^minor  strain.  Unhappy  Africa  with 
her  burdens  comes  before  me.  I  see  the  barbaric  spirit 
get  the  mastery  of  them.  They  wildly  throw  their  arms 
in  the  air,  hysterically  seize  each  other  by  the  waist,  as 
if  the  tarantula  had  bitten  them ;  then  they  advance  slow- 
ly and  with  majesty  towards  the  house,  with  courtesy 
and  obeisance.  They  ask  for  "  old  Missus,"  and  raise  her 
hand  to  their  lips  and  their  brows ;  then  a  fine  athletic 
negro  asks  for  the  baby.  It  is  brought  in  its  long  white 
robe;  he  takes  it  tenderly  and  passes  it  from  one  to 


A   VISIT   TO   HAVANA  75 

another ;  they  all  smile,  kiss  the  new-comer,  and  show 
most  enviable  ivory  teeth,  thus  saluting  age  and  youth 
with  fine  poetic  instincts.  Then  they  bring  forward 
their  oldest  man,  Manuel,  the  African  prince,  who  per- 
forms the  same  Oriental  homage  and  utters  more  rude 
original  rhymes,  to  which  the  whole  familj^-  listen  po- 
litely, and  they  all  disappear  slowly ;  the  festival  of  a 
Santa  Cruz  Christmas  is  at  an  end. 

We  went  through  the  Caribbean  Sea  towards  Cuba, 
stopping  at  Jacmel — miserable  place — at  Hayti  and 
Jamaica,  all  very  sad ;  rounded  the  island  of  Cuba,  and 
came  to  those  fortifications  at  Havana  which  cost  the 
Spanish  king  so  much  that  he  asked  if  they  were  built 
of  silver!  Our  steamer  happened  to  be  the  English 
Trent,  which  years  after  was  made  historical  by  the 
fact  that  Mason  and  Slidell  were  on  board  of  her  when 
a  Yankee  gun  stopped  her  further  progress.  Havana 
was  then  a  beautiful,  peaceful  town,  full  of  rich  people 
who  were  fond  of  entertaining.  I  remember  we  attend- 
ed a  grand  fete  at  the  palace  of  Mr.  Aldama,  the  rich- 
est of  the  Cubans.  It  was  fairy-like  in  its  beauty,  regal 
in  magnificence.  We  went  to  the  opera,  one  of  the  gay- 
est in  the  world ;  Ave  drove  in  a  volante  up  and  down 
that  gorgeous  Paseo  of  a  Sunday  afternoon,  all  the 
ladies  in  full  dress ;  we  bought  fans ;  we  enjoyed  and 
explored  the  romantic  Spanish  city,  full  of  luxury.  But, 
alas !  the  negroes,  the  slaves  with  the  chain-gang,  each 
with  an  iron  ball  on  a  lame  leg,  cleaning  the  streets, 
spoiled  it  for  me.  Even  then  Americans  were  objects 
of  suspicion,  and  we  had  to  conceal  our  identity  while 
an  English  oiRcer  took  us  over  the  Moro  Castle.  We 
w^ent  out  to  Matanzas  to  see  a  cofi'ee  plantation.  It 
was  all  very  gay  and  very  tropical  and  yet  unlike 
Santa  Cruz.     There  was  no  ennui  in  this  lively  Havana 


76  AN   EPISTLE    TO    POSTEKITY 

life ;  yet  there  were  mutterings,  not  loud  but  deep,  over 
the  hated  Spaniard.  Captain  Walker,  the  filibuster,  had 
been  in  that  neighborhood.  There  was  talk  of  annexa- 
tion, but  the  trouble  had  not  come  yet.  So  I  remember 
the  island  in  perhaps  its  period  of  greatest  prosperity, 
and  certainly  when  it  was  one  of  the  gayest  and  most 
agreeable  of  winter  sojourns. 

JSTew  York  had  three  great  visitors  within  the  two 
years  after  my  wedding  journey.  They  were  Rachel, 
Thackeray,  and  Fanny  Kemble.  Each  a  memory  for  a 
lifetime. 

It  was  after  a  tiresome  journey  from  our  country 
place,  one  October  evening,  that,  making  a  hasty  toilet, 
I  went  to  the  theatre  to  see  Rachel  in  Phedre,  I  did 
not  know  that  I  was  to  have  this  supreme  pleasure  so 
soon,  although  I  knew  I  should  see  her  sometime.  So 
incoherent  were  my  expectations  that  I  thought  my 
early  memorizing  of  the  great  play  would  help  me  to 
understand  her  and  to  measure  the  greatness  of  her 
acting. 

I  had  been  made,  when  studying  French,  to  memorize 
those  lofty  Alexandrines  of  Racine's  masterpiece ;  there- 
fore the  story  of  Phedre  was  very  familiar.  Remember- 
ing that  the  goddess  had  condemned  the  poor  queen  to 
fall  in  love  with  her  stepson,  I  pictured  her  as  rather  an 
elderly  person,  perhaps  a  sort  of  Mrs.  Nickleby.  Who, 
then,  was  this  young,  sorrowful  woman  coming  in  with 
tragic  face,  dragging  after  her,  as  if  its  weight  were  in- 
supportable, the  long  crimson  mantle  of  a  queen  ?  Who 
was  this  dark-eyed  creature,  so  young,  so  lovely,  who 
sank  into  her  imperial  seat,  the  crimson  mantle  draped 
behind  her,  throwing  out  her  beautiful  arms  and  her 
delicate  little  head?    The  lover,  an  ugly,  big-headed 


RACHEL  AND   HER   ACTING  77 

young  Frenchman,  against  whose  presence  she  shud- 
dered so  that  she  seemed  to  shake  the  stage,  fully  car- 
ried out  the  idea  that  the  power  of  the  goddess  must 
have  been  supreme,  for  no  woman  in  her  senses  could 
have  fallen  in  love  with  him.  Eachel  never  seemed  to 
walk,  and  in  Phedre  she  gave  the  idea  that  a  serpent 
was  hidden  under  her  long  robe,  on  whose  undulations 
she  was  moved  along  irrespective  of  her  own  volition. 
Her  eyes  were  half  closed,  and  her  whole  face,  expressive 
of  baleful  passion  which  her  nobler  self  hated,  was  the 
most  beautiful,  painful  thing  possible.  Her  voice  was 
the  very  soul  of  music.  She  did  not  seem  to  know  that 
an  audience  was  present.  Her  absorption  in  her  part 
was  so  perfect  that  I  was  full  of  pity  for  her,  and  won- 
dered if  she  would  live  until  the  end  of  the  play.  When 
it  was  ended  I  found  myself  paralyzed  and  unable  to 
rise  for  some  moments.  It  was  the  most  powerful  of 
all  artistic  emotions  that  I  have  experienced  in  a  long 
life  of  theatre-going. 

I  afterwards  saw  her  in  all  her  best  parts — Adrienne 
Lecouvreur,  Camille,  in  which  she  was  emphatically 
beautiful,  in  a  classic  Greek  dress  with  scarlet  fillet  in 
her  hair;  and  again  in  a  charming  comedy,  Le  Moineau 
de  Leshie,  in  which  her  rare  smile  and  playfulness  were 
most  conspicuous.  I  remember  even  the  beauty  of  her 
robe  in  this  play. 

The  wonder  of  Eachel's  playing  was  the  wonder  of 
all  genius.  You  did  not  see  her,  or  her  art ;  you  saw  the 
real  creature  whom  her  art  portrayed.  In  this  respect 
Salvini  was  nearest  to  her  of  any  artist  I  have  seen. 
Her  sister,  Sarah  Felix,  was  an  admirable  artiste,  and  so 
was  her  brother,  Eaphael ;  but  they  played  on  the  stage, 
while  Eachel  floated  in  an  ether  over  it.  When  the  two 
sisters  played  Elizabeth  and  Mary  in  the  great  drama  of 


78  AN    EPISTLE   TO   POSTERITY 

Marie  Stuart  there  was  a  question  as  to  which  was  the 
greater  queen;  but  when  Mary  Stuart  receives  her 
death  sentence  there  was  no  doubt.  Such  a  creature 
ruled  heaven  as  well  as  earth,  and  human  misfortunes 
assumed  their  appropriate  place  beneath  her  real  ex- 
altation. And  yet  this  part  was  not  Kachel's  greatest 
triumph.  She  reigns  in  memory  as  Camille,  the  Eo- 
man  sister. 

Soon  after  the  departure  of  Eachel,  Fanny  Kemble 
began  a  course  of  readings  in  JN'ew  York.  This  gifted 
niece  of  Mrs.  Siddons  gave  us  all  the  great  Kemble  tra- 
ditions, and  her  voice,  a  miracle  of  expressive  music, 
added  the  final  charm.  It  was  a  message  from  Shake- 
speare. 

I  liked  her  best  in  the  Tem,pest^  as  the  contrast  of 
Ariel  and  Caliban  is  so  extraordinary,  The  majestic 
poetry,  and,  again,  the  broad  humor  of  the  minor 
characters,  especially  of  the  drunken  Trinculo,  afforded 
her  all  the  sweep  and  scope  she  needed  for  her  tre- 
mendous powers.  She  absolutely  reeled  in  the  scene 
with  Trinculo.     Her  Caliban  was  immense. 

She  was  very  grand  in  Measure  for  Measure  and 
Cynibeline^  two  plays  with  which  I  had  not  been  fa- 
miliar. And  oh !  how  great  in  Macbeth  and  King  Lear  ! 
The  latter  was  almost  too  much.  It  gave  me  a  head- 
ache.    I  am  not  sure  I  would  like  to  see  it  again. 

I  heard  Thackeray's  first  series  of  lectures  in  ^N^ew 
York  on  "  The  Four  Georges  "  ;  but  I  was  not  destined 
to  know  him  until  he  came  the  second  time,  in  1855. 
America  had  welcomed  him  as  the  author  of  Punch- s 
Prize  Nomlists  and  of  Vanity  Fair,  which  reached  us 
about  1849.  The  enthusiastic  regard  of  Charlotte  Bronte 
for  Mr.  Thackeray,  who  spoke  of  him  as  the  ''first  social 
regenerate  of  the  day,  the  one  who  should  restore  to  rec- 


THACKERAY  AT  THE  CENTURY.  79 

titude  the  warped  order  of  things,"  found  an  echo  in  our 
hearts.  He  was  a  complete  success.  He  was  as  dehght- 
ful  as  his  own  literary  personages  are,  and  so  "  like  his 
writings"  that  every  one  spoke  of  it.  His  allusions,  his 
voice,  his  looks,  were  all  just  what  we  had  expected. 
Never  did  a  long-hoped-for  hero  fill  the  bill  so  thoroughly. 
His  loving  and  life-giving  genius  spoke  in  every  word. 
Wonderful  examples  of  excellence  those  papers  on  "  The 
Four  Georges,"  and  delivered  in  a  clear,  fine,  rich  voice. 
Their  simplicity  was  matchless,  and  the  fun  in  him  came 
out  as  he  described  the  fourth  George,  and  then  stopped, 
not  smiling  himself,  while  we  all  laughed.  He  silently 
stood,  his  head  tipped  back,  and  then  calmly  wiped  his 
spectacles  and  went  on.  He  had  a  charm  as  a  speaker 
which  no  one  has  since  caught :  it  defies  analysis,  as  does 
his  genius.     It  was  Thackerayian. 

I  think  that  I  heard  then  that  he  was  more  widely 
read  in  America  than  in  England ;  he  was  certainly 
treated  with  great  hospitality.  The  Century  Club  (then 
wholly  made  up  of  authors,  artists,  and  actors)  was  pro- 
nounced by  him  the  "  best  club  in  the  world."  He  was 
allowed  the  fullest  liberty  there ;  and  as  he  was  a  man  of 
moods,  and  his  mood  was  sometimes  silence,  he  was  glad 
of  a  corner  where  he  could  sit  unobserved.  Fitz-Greene 
Halleck,  who  wrote  "  Green  be  the  turf  above  thee !" 
and  "At  midnight  in  her  guarded  tent,"  entertained 
him;  and  Hackett,  the  comedian,  and  Sparrowgrass 
Cozzens  and  Willis  and  Bryant  and  Cooper  were  all 
of  this  party.  While  in  Boston  James  T.  Field,  most 
admirable  of  friends,  took  that  care  of  him  which  his 
genial  nature  suggested.  Washington  Irving  and  Bay- 
ard Taylor  were  also  here  then  to  greet  him. 

I  saw  him  several  times  during  his  later  visit  in  1855, 
and  in  the  company  of  Miss  Sallie  Baxter,  who  was  the 


80  AN   EPISTLE   TO   POSTERITY 

beautiful  girl  who  suggested  to  him  the  character  or 
personal  appearance  of  Ethel  New  comb,  at  least  such 
was  the  gossip. 

I  remember  going  with  her  to  one  of  his  lectures  and 
seeing  Thackeray  in  the  greenroom  before  he  entered. 
It  was  here  he  showed  the  playful  and  engaging  side 
of  his  manner.  Thackeray  was  a  gentleman  born  and 
bred,  and  his  polish  of  manner  never  left  him,  even 
when  his  fun  would  have  made  him  boyish. 

Sallie  Baxter  was  a  dark  beauty  of  the  Spanish  type, 
most  exquisitely  lovely,  with  fabulous  great  black  eyes, 
whose  lashes  swept  her  eyebrows.  She  was  a  natural, 
unaffected  person,  and  during  his  stay  in  New  York 
Thackeray  was  frequently  a  guest  in  her  mother's  house. 
Miss  Baxter  seemed  to  treat  him  like  a  daughter.  Per- 
haps she  brought  back  those  dear  ones  whom  he  had  left 
at  13  Young  Street,  South  Kensington.  Many  suppers 
and  dinners  and  theatre  parties  brought  me  to  see  the 
great  man  rather  intimately,  and  I  do  not  remember  a 
more  easy-going  and  genial  person.  His  tall,  command- 
ing form  and  gray  head,  his  nez  retrousse  and  his  eye- 
glasses, his  firm  tread  and  charming  laugh,  got  to  be  as 
well  known  in  New  York  as  they  were  in  London.  His 
little  notes  in  his  very  neat  handwriting  found  their 
way  into  our  albums.  He  was  always  accessible  and 
full  of  enjoyment,  and  yet  when  we  saw  him  sailing 
along  majestically  down  Broadway,  with  his  hands  in 
his  pockets,  there  was  an  air  of  melancholy  and  of  pre- 
occupation in  his  expressive  face.  But  he  was  "  as  ret- 
icent as  he  was  brave,"  and  no  one  heard  him  speak 
of  his  sorrows,  if  he  had  any.  Perhaps  this  was  one 
of  the  happiest  periods  of  his  life.  Sallie  Baxter  mar- 
ried at  the  South,  was  separated  from  her  Northern 
family  by  the  terrors  of  the  civil  war,  and  died  young, 


A   DINNER  WITH   MISS   TH  ACKER  AY  W. 

away  from  them.  I  think  she  died  about  the  same 
time  that  Thackeray  did,  perhaps  a  year  before. 

A  kind-hearted,  noble,  tender  man ;  a  generous,  sincere 
gentleman ;  a  healthy,  good  liver,  and  with  a  fine  grip 
to  his  hearty  hand.  He  was  a  big  man  and  heavy,  and 
walked  with  a  strong  step ;  a  healthful,  broad-shouldered 
Englishman,  whose  jollity  and  fun  seemed  to  forbid  ret- 
icence on  his  part,  but  who  could  and  did,  at  the  touch 
of  humbug  or  affectation,  retreat  into  himself,  turn  away 
with  an  expression  of  polished  irony  on  his  face,  and, 
with  a  singular  movement  of  the'^head,  assure  the  bore 
that  he  was  no  longer  needed. 

When  we  went  to  England  in  1869,  Miss  Thackeray 
gave  us  a  dinner.  Her  home  then  was  with  her  sister 
and  her  husband,  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Leslie  Stephen.  The 
afterwards  much-talked-of  Mr.  Justice  Stephen  was  of 
the  party,  and  Doyle  was  there,  the  artist  of  Punchy  so 
distinguished  for  his  "  Brown,  Jones,  and  Eobinson."  I 
had  a  letter  to  Miss  Thackeray  from  Dr.  Bellows ;  but  to 
be  an  American  and  a  friend  of  their  father  was  to  these 
ladies  a  sufficient  introduction,  and  they  treated  us  with 
great  kindness.  "We  saw  many  of  the  MSS.  of  Thack- 
eray's famous  works,  illustrated  by  his  own  hand,  and 
Mr.  and  Mrs.  Leslie  Stephen  took  every  pains  to  show  us 
these  treasures. 

During  this  dinner,  at  which  Miss  Thackeray  made 
herself  very  agreeable,  a  message  came  in  from  Madame 
Eitchie  saying  that  her  son,  Richmond  Ritchie,  had 
passed  his  examinations  successfully.  This  seemed  to 
be  much-longed-for  news  to  all  of  them,  and  it  is  the 
more  agreeable  to  remember,  since  he  is  the  gentleman 
who  has  made  her  so  happy  as  her  husband  for  twenty 
years. 

I  had  the  pleasure  of  meeting  this  famous  and  agree- 


82  AN   EPISTLE   TO   POSTERITY 

able  Mrs.  Kitchie  at  Aix-les- Bains  in  1888,  and  to  sit  and 
talk  with  her  near  a  vine-clad  wall,  up  which  the  lizards 
were  climbing,  was  indeed  a  great  pleasure.  Her  com- 
panionship made  this  prettiest  place  on  earth,  Aix-les- 
Bains,  even  more  attractive  ("Savoie,  c'est  la  grace  alpes- 
tre,"  says  Yictor  Hugo)  than  it  is  by  nature. 

And  indeed  here,  by  the  Lake  of  Bouget,  did  I  have 
one  of  the  most  treasured  talks  of  Thackeray  with  one 
of  the  dearest  of  women,  his  much -beloved  daughter 
Anne. 

Anthony  Trollope  said  of  Thackeray,  "  One  loves  him 
as  one  loves  a  woman,  tenderly  and  with  thought- 
fulness,  thinking  of  him  when  away  from  him  as  a 
source  of  joy  which  cannot  be  analyzed,  but  is  full  of 
comfort." 

]N"or  was  he  less  dear  to  others  who  saw  less  of  him. 

The  great  heart  which  kept  that  gigantic  brain  go- 
ing was  indeed  a  tender  heart. 

These  early  fifties  were  the  blessed  days,  when  we  had 
a  novel  by  Dickens  and  one  by  Thackeray  running  at  the 
same  time ;  and  Charlotte  Bronte,  having  overwhelmed 
us  with  Jane  Eyre^  was  good  enough  to  give  us  Yillette^ 
which  has  in  it  the  best  description  of  EachePs  acting 
which  I  have  ever  seen,  and  her  not  less  characteristic 
novel  of  Shirley.     Such  was  our  literary  luxury. 

Among  the  visitors  to  New  York  who  created  no  lit- 
tle stir  in  the  early  fifties  was  Miss  Anne  Pamela  Cun- 
ningham, from  Yirginia,  introduced  by  Mrs.  Anna  Cora 
Mowatt  Ritchie.  Miss  Cunningham  started  the  idea  of 
buying  Mount  Yernon.  It  reminds  me  of  how  small  a 
town  New  York  was  then  that  we  soon  set  the  whole 
of  it  ringing  with  this  enthusiasm.  Dion  Boucicault 
and  Agnes  Robertson  played  their  sensational  drama 
Pauvrette  for  us ;  Mrs.  Mowatt  Ritchie  gave  some  tab- 


MISS    ANNE    PAMELA    CUNNINGHAM  83 

leaux  at  Mr.  Edward  Cooper's.  Mr.  Everett,  however, 
was  our  best  friend  in  the  way  of  raising  money. 

I  think  Mr.  Everett's  contribution  to  this  purchase 
amounted  to  nearly  $50,000.  I  know  that  Mr.  Kobert 
Bonner  sent  him  a  check  for  $10,000  for  writing  some 
papers  for  the  Ledger^  all  of  which  Mr.  Everett  contrib- 
uted to  the  cause.  Miss  Mary  M.  Hamilton  was  made 
Eegent  of  the  State,  and,  assisted  by  the  best  people  of 
JSTew  York,  bravely  carried  the  burden  to  her  lamented 
death. 

What  a  forlorn,  old,  neglected  place  Mount  Yernon 
was  then !  but  how  soon  it  became  cared  for  and  clean ! 
And  now  it  is  almost  as  it  was  when  Washington  lived 
there,  if  we  can  spiritually  see  the  real  furnishing  of  the 
past.  The  office  of  regent  fell  to  the  able  hands  of  Mrs. 
Justine  Van  Kensselaer  Townsend,  a  Colonial  Dame, 
and  fitted  in  every  way  to  be  the  sponsor  of  such  a 
trust.  I  rejoice  that  it  is  now  the  care  of  the  women  of 
America,  but  I  am  glad  I  remember  the  poor  old  place 
in  1848,  when  it  had  nothing  to  look  at  but  the  key  of 
the  Bastile,  which  nobody  wished  to  take  away  or  steal. 

I  worked  with  Miss  Hamilton  all  these  early  years 
in  favor  of  this  patriotic  object.  Glad  were  we  that  it 
was  paid  for  and  safe  before  the  dreadful  days  of  the 
war,  for  we  had  other  and  more  urgent  need  for  all  the 
money  that  any  one  could  give. 

Miss  Anne  Pamela  Cunningham  was  aristocratic  to  a 
great  fault,  and  so  very  "  Secesh  "  in  her  sympathies  that 
she  would  not  speak  to  any  l^orthern  person  after  the 
war.  Mrs.  Kitchie,  poor  woman !  after  her  striking  career 
as  a  beauty  in  New  York's  best  set,  and  her  career  as 
an  actress  in  America  and  England,  married  Mr.  Kitchie, 
of  Eichmond,  went  abroad  during  the  war,  and  died  in 
London  poor,  and  inexpressibly  saddened  at  the  inevita- 


84  -^  AN   EPISTLE    TO    POSTERITY 

ble  separation  which  that  war  had  brought  about.  One 
of  the  most  interesting  events  of  the  early  fifties  had 
been  to  me  the  seeing  her  official  retirement  from  the 
stage.  She  played  Pauline  in  the  Lady  of  Lyons,  in 
which  she  had  made  her  debut,  ten  years  before,  at  the 
old  Park  Theatre.  The  house  was  crowded  as  the  pretty 
blond  woman  made  her  graceful  speech.  The  next  most 
interesting  event  was  her  wedding,  at  the  country  place 
of  her  father  on  Long  Island,  and  a  very  gay  fete  it  was. 
Her  husband  was  an  editor  at  Eichmond,  Ya.,  a  most 
gentlemanly  and  excellent  person,  tenderly  fond,  and  true 
to  her.  But  the  sorrows  of  their  country  tore  them 
apart,  nor  did  they  live  to  see  the  day  of  reconciliation, 
prosperity,  and  reconstruction. 

I  have  often  thought  that  some  record  of  this  service 
of  hers  should  be  perpetuated  at  Mount  Yernon.  I 
know  that  Miss  Hamilton  (afterwards  Mrs.  George  L. 
Schuyler)  had  this  very  much  at  heart.  Anna  Cora 
Mo  watt  Kitchie  brought  this  idea  to  the  notice  of  the 
public  of  New  York,  the  purchase  of  Mount  Yernon, 
and  she  should  have  her  picture  hung  in  one  of  those 
now  beautifully  restored  rooms,  and  the  memory  of 
Miss  Anne  Pamela  Cunningham  should  be  venerated. 


CHAPTER  V 

The  Visit  of  the  Prince  of  Wales — The  Ball  at  the  Academy  of  Music 
— The  First  Days  of  the  War — The  Sanitary  Commission — The 
Metropolitan  Fair — Washington  in  1863— General  McClellan  and 
the  French  Princes — A  Ball  at  the  White  House  and  Picnics  in 
Camp. 

One  of  the  first  events  of  social  importance  in  the 
early  sixties  was  the  visit  of  the  Prince  of  Wales  to 
New  York.  I  remember  the  pretty,  slender,  fair-haired 
youth  very  well,  and  went  to  the  ball  given  in  his  honor. 
Ladies  then  dressed  in  the  style  of  Eugenie's  portrait  by 
Winterhalter — long,  flowing  trains,  a  rather  small  hoop, 
tight  sleeves,  the  low-necked  dress  defined  around  the 
neck  with  a  berthe  of  lace,  and  the  hair  dressed  low  in 
bandeaux  under  the  ears,  with  wreaths  and  streaming 
garlands  of  artificial  flowers  on  the  head.  Certainly  the 
style  left  a  fine  figure  well  to  itself,  with  no  impertinent 
deformities. 

Yery  aristocratic  and  grand  looked  the  assemblage  in 
the  old  Academy  of  Music  at  the  ball  given  to  greet 
the  Prince. 

The  Fishes,  Belmonts,  Astors,  Cuttings,  Morrises,  Kings, 
Livingstons,  Hamiltons,  Jays,  Duers,  Emmets,  Kussells, 
Cunards,  Howlands,  Aspinwalls,  Grinnells,  Schuylers, 
Pells,  and  Rhinelanders  made  then  a  very  decided  and 
exclusive  circle,  of  which  Mrs.  Belmont  might  be  called 
the  fashionable  leader.  Mrs.  Hamilton  Fish,  Mrs.  Kobert 
Cutting,  and  Mrs.  J.  J.  Astor  were  the  duchesses ;  Mrs. 


86  AN  EPISTLE   TO   POSTERITY 

Lloyd  Aspinwall  and  Mrs.  G.  G.  Howland  the  great 
beauties.  Miss  Helen  Eussell  was  elected  to  dance  with 
the  Prince.  A  very  beautiful  girl,  whom  I  saw  for  the 
first  time  that  evening,  was  Miss  Pierrepont,  of  Brooklyn, 
who  afterwards  married  Mr.  Rutherford  Stuy vesant,  and 
who  died  in  her  early  married  life. 

This  ball,  however,  was  more  municipal  than  exclusive. 
I  remember  that  Mr.  Maunsell  B.  Field,  a  very  accom- 
plished literary  man,  took  great  interest  in  it,  and  was 
especially  distressed  when  a  loud  explosion  took  place 
and  down  went  the  floor,  a  great  temporary  structure 
built  over  the  stage  and  parquet  of  the  Academy.  I 
remember  seeing  strong  men  grow  pale  at  this  catastro- 
phe ;  some  women  shrieked,  and  the  Duke  of  Newcastle 
dragged  the  little  Prince  out  of  harm's  way.  One  friend 
of  mine,  who  had  a  great  horror  of  balls,  happened  to 
stand  directly  over  the  very  spot  where  the  floor  sank 
gently  down  into  a  sort  of  Y-shaped  funnel  and  then 
stopped.  "  There,"  said  she,  "  I  told  you  so !"  as  her  hus- 
band dragged  her  out.  It  might  have  been  the  most 
frightful  catastrophe  of  the  year,  but  it  was,  mercifully, 
not.  It  was  easily  mended,  and  the  Prince  was  gayly 
dancing  and  talking  and  laughing  over  the  late  chasm. 
It  was  great  "  nuts  "  to  him,  doubtless. 

I  principally  enjoyed  talking  to  the  Duke  of  New- 
castle, who  told  me  of  some  of  his  anxieties  about  the 
Prince. 

"  Prince,  how  air  you?  and  how's  your  mother?"  was 
the  address  of  one  lady  to  the  rather  astonished  boy. 

I  liked  to  see  the  gay  procession  of  carriages  and  sol- 
diers who  accompanied  the  Prince  on  his  way  from  his 
steamer  to  his  hotel  through  crowds  of  gazers.  The  city 
was  en  fete.  It  was  but  a  little  city  then  compared  with 
what  it  is  now.     Albert  Edward  bowed  to  right  and  left, 


THE   FIRST   DAYS    OF   THE   WAR  87 

and  put  up  his  hand  to  smooth  his  hair,  boyish  fashion. 
He  visited  Mr.  Buchanan,  the  President,  and  then  went 
on  to  Kichmond,  where  he  was  not  so  well  treated. 

Mr.  Buchanan  wrote  a  beautiful  letter  to  Queen  Vic- 
toria about  the  manly  bearing  of  her  son,  and  of  how 
well  he  had  passed  through  a  trying  ordeal  for  one  of  his 
age.  Indeed,  Albert  Edward  always  had  tact ;  he  has  it 
still.  "  Dignified,  frank,  and  affable,  he  has  conciliated, 
wherever  he  has  been,  the  kindness  and  respect  of  a  sen- 
sitive and  discriminating  people,"  said  Mr.  Buchanan  in 
this  very  good  letter. 

Probably  one  of  the  many  reasons  why  Yictoria  and 
Albert  were  so  friendly  to  the  North  when  their  friend- 
ship was  needed  was  their  remembrance  of  the  kindness 
of  the  Northern  people  to  their  son. 

Poor  Mr.  Buchanan !  the  Northerners  were  not  satis- 
fied that  he  was  trying  to  prevent  the  war,  and  General 
Dix's  emphatic  message  to  an  officer  of  the  navy,  "  If 
any  one  fires  on  the  American  flag,  shoot  him  on  the 
spot,"  fired  the  American  heart ;  and  yet  all  the  Southern- 
ers and  Washingtonians  thought  Mr.  Buchanan  was  do- 
ing exactly  right.  Miss  Josephine  Seaton  wrote  to  Mr. 
Buchanan,  in  June,  1862:  "I  consider  you  the  last  con- 
stitutional President  we  shall  ever  see.  At  a  moment 
when  passion  whirled  the  country  to  frenzy  you  had 
the  true  courage  to  refrain,  to  abide  within  the  lines 
marked  out  by  the  Constitution  for  the  Executive. 
Were  you  still  with  us  we  should  not  be  embarked  in 
this  fearful  fratricidal  strife." 

Such  were  the  two  sides  of  the  shield.  I  think  every 
American  should  be  glad  to  have  not  seen  that  fratrici- 
dal strife. 

And  yet  it  was  profoundly  grand  and  heart-stirring.  I 
had  just  grown  to  know  Theodore  Winthrop,  the  young 


88  AN  EPISTLE   TO   POSTEEITT 

author  of  Cecil  Dreeme — a  name  which  seemed  to  de- 
scribe him.  And  it  was  heart-breaking  to  learn  that 
his  life  ended  at  Ball's  Bluff.  I  remember  the  soft  sum- 
mer morning  when  I  looked  from  my  window  to  see  a 
gun-carriage  with  a  coffin  covered  with  roses,  on  which 
lay  his  little  blue  cap,  his  sorrowing  friends  walking  by 
his  side.  The  last  of  Theodore  Winthrop !  The  next 
day  five  young  captains  were  borne  by  dead  on  their 
shields.  It  seemed  as  if  not  all  the  principles  in  the 
world  were  worth  that  agony.  Had  it  not  been  for  the 
Sanitary  Commission,  our  hearts  would  have  broken. 

It  is  amazing  to  remember  how  every  one  responded 
to  the  trumpet-call  which  Dr.  Bellows  sent  forth,  how 
every  woman  became  a  "  worker  "  for  the  soldiers  in  the 
field.  It  was  no  holiday  enthusiasm ;  it  was  the  business 
of  life. 

I  became  the  secretary  of  the  Metropolitan  Fair,  and 
wrote  innumerable  letters  to  all  our  representatives  in 
Europe.  Mr.  Motley  and  Mr.  Marsh  (at  Kome)  re- 
sponded nobly.  All  answered  well.  I  only  happen  to 
remember  these  two  men  whose  letters  were  uncom- 
monly eloquent.  I  remember  that  I  sold  Mr.  Motley's 
letter  for  fifteen  dollars  at  our  autograph  counter — a 
fact  which  I  told  him  in  1869,  when  he  was  minister  to 
England.  I  said  "  that  ardent  youth  would  have  bought 
your  name  over  again  half  a  dozen  times  for  that 
amount,  Mr.  Motley."  "  Well,"  said  he,  "  I  will  let  him 
have  it  very  cheap  now."  After  a  winter's  work  we 
sent  Dr.  Bellows  "  one  million  three  hundred  and  sixty- 
five  dollars,"  in  one  check,  as  the  result  of  our  winter's 
work  at  the  Metropolitan  Fair. 

Richard  Grant  White  was  the  secretary  of  the  male 
part  of  the  work,  and  together  we  got  up  a  Dramatic 
Committee  which  was  very  successful  in  its  little  way. 


THE   SANITARY   COMMISSION  8» 

Indeed,  we  made  twelve  thousand  dollars  in  a  month. 
Mr.  Lester  Wallack  became  stage-manager,  and  ladies 
and  gentlemen  worked  hard  in  their  various  parts  at 
comedy  and  opera.  One  of  our  most  beautiful  jeuiies 
premiers  was  Archie  Pell,  and  our  play-bills  bore  this 
striking  record  (he  left  his  part  un played  one  evening) : 
"  Lieutenant  Pell  obliged  to  leave  for  the  seat  of  war." 
It  was  all  like  the  ball  the  night  before  Waterloo. 

A  strange  carmagnole  gayety  reigned  in  society.  Peo- 
ple were  only  half  sane.  They  w,ent  to  the  theatre  madly, 
worked  seven  hours  a  day  at  the  Sanitary  Commission,  and 
then  danced  all  night.  Young  fops  went  off  to  the  war 
and  became  wonderful  soldiers.  "The  puppies  fight 
well."  Leaders  of  the  german  became  good  leaders  of 
men,  and  one  of  the  best  drill -master  generals  had 
been  a  dancing-master. 

In  our  own  ranks  at  the  fair,  Mrs.  Hamilton  Fish  was 
our  president,  Mrs.  David  Lane  vice-president;  Mrs. 
Astor  was  a  diligent  worker,  Mrs.  James  B.  Colgate 
very  ably  led  off  an  auxiliary  in  Union  Square,  and  a 
great  many  earnest  women  killed  themselves  by  over- 
work. A  most  gifted  and  rare  woman,  one  of  our  first 
humorists,  Mrs.  C.  P.  Kirkland,  feU  dead  in  the  fair 
building  one  crowded  evening ;  and  Mrs.  David  Dudley 
Field  died  at  her  own  house,  just  after  leaving  the  fair. 

One  of  the  most  curious  epidemics  was  that  of  an  un- 
bounded generosity.  Everybody  would  give  away  his 
or  her  most  treasured  possession  to  be  sold  for  the  sol- 
diers. I  have  always  been  afraid  that  many  rare  edi- 
tions of  books,  taken  from  libraries  and  committed  to 
these  fairs,  and  many  an  autograph,  were  sacrificed. 
Old  silver,  too,  was  given  with  reckless  freedom,  to  be 
sadly  missed  afterwards.  And  none  of  them  brought 
what  they  were  worth. 


90  AN   EPISTLE   TO    POSTERITY 

Mais  c^est  la  guerre.  "War  is  a  most  uneconomical, 
foolish,  poor  arrangement,  a  bloody  enrichment  of  that 
soil  which  bears  the  sweet  flower  of  peace,  and  we  saw 
the  worst  of  it  in  many  ways. 

We  went  on,  feeding  the  hungry,  giving  drink  to  the 
thirsty,  clothing  the  soldier,  binding  up  his  wounds,  har- 
boring the  stranger,  visiting  the  sick,  ministering  to  the 
prisoner,  and  burying  the  dead,  until  that  blessed  day  at 
Appomattox  Court  House  relieved  the  strain.  I  went 
to  Washington  in  1862-3,  when  it  was  a  camp.  Proba- 
bly no  capital  in  a  state  of  siege  was  ever  more  gay  and 
amusing.  Foreigners,  princes,  and  potentates,  names  of 
a  thousand  years  and  names  of  yesterday,  were  all  jum- 
bled in  a  state  of  frenzy  and  confusion.  And  the  mud ! 
Oh,  the  mud !  I  saw  General  McClellan  with  his  two 
young  aides,  the  French  princes.  Count  de  Paris  and 
Due  de  Chartres,  ride  into  Washington  so  encrusted 
with  mud  that  they  looked  like  fossil  monsters. 

All  about  the  city  for  thirty  mile^  spread  the  tents, 
the  camp-fires,  the  stockades  of  a  citizen  soldiery,  ap- 
prentices to  the  great  art  of  war.  Every  new  condition 
of  human  life,  every  possible  embarrassment  of  climate, 
food,  and  shelter,  came  to  try  men's  souls.  Suffering  of 
the  keenest  dwelt  in  those  tents,  besides  joviality  and 
excitement ;  for  the  light,  easily  amused  American  tem- 
perament found  much  to  like  and  to  laugh  at  even  in 
the  surroundings  of  cold  and  mud,  poor  food,  and  in- 
eradicable dirt,  not  to  speak  of  the  sober  realities  of 
the  measles  and  scarlet-fever  and  smallpox  and  typhoid 
fever,  all  of  which  paid  our  army  a  visit  from  time  to 
time. 

I  went  to  the  great  ball  at  the  White  House  given  by 
Mr.  Lincoln  to  General  McClellan.  There  were  five  thou- 
sand people  at  this  ball,  and  ten  thousand  outside  disap- 


GENERAL  MCCLELLAN   AND   THE   FRENCH   PRINCES         91 

pointed.  All  the  upper  grades  of  the  army  and  navy, 
the  diplomatic  corps,  the  distinguished  members  of  the 
two  Houses,  the  Supreme  Court,  the  cabinet,  foreigners 
of  rank,  and  that  class  of  persons  who,  having  none  of 
these  claims,  are,  by  some  subtle  magnetism,  among  those 
who  are  always  invited  everywhere  —  all  these  were 
there. 

The  two  French  princes  were,  of  course,  most  con- 
spicuous and  honored.  The  Comte  de  Paris  was  then 
tall,  slender,  good-looking,  and  with  the  ideal  manners 
of  a  prince.  The  Due  de  Chartres  was  taller,  thinner, 
less  handsome,  but  with  fine  manners.  They  were  both 
young  enough  to  enjoy  a  ball  and  the  society  of  young 
ladies. 

There  were  the  brilliant  young  soldiers  gathered  from 
the  ranks  of  civil  life,  over  whom  hung  the  fatal  pall ; 
but  the  clash  of  civil  war  paused  while  the  waltzes 
played,  and  the  gay  festival  went  on  while  Death  waited 
outside.  A  great,  original,  and  distinct  form,  a  gro- 
tesque figure  perhaps,  but  lighted  up  with  a  pair  of 
wonderful  eyes,  stood  there  to  receive  the  guests — a 
man  over  whom  hung  the  deepest  trials  and  the  baleful 
death  of  assassination,  Abraham  Lincoln. 

His  smile  and  voice  were  beautiful  and  his  eyes 
superb.  There  his  beauty  ended,  but  the  magnetic  re- 
sult of  genius  remained.  Every  one  is  glad  to  have 
touched  his  hand. 

We  all  felt  that  the  men  about  us  were  making  his- 
tory, and  that  we  were  looking  at  heroes,  if  we  could 
only  find  them  out.  Mine  was  General  McClellan, 
whom  I  always  continued  to  admire.  I  remember  now 
what  a  thrill  ran  through  me  as  he  was  kind  enough  to 
come  and  talk  to  me.  His  style  was  Yery  quiet  and  re- 
served, but  his  conversation  had  a  charm,  impressing 


92  AN   EPISTLE   TO   POSTERITY 

one  with  the  feeling  that  he  could  say  a  great  deal 
more  if  he  only  would. 

Washington  was  at  that  time  full  of  illy  regulated 
and  discontented  spirits.  Women  also  had  ranged  all 
the  way  from  flannels  to  flirtation.  Among  many  bet- 
ter women  was  the  femme  inco'mjprise,  who  wanted  to 
"  nurse  in  the  hospitals."  She,  however,  wished  to  do 
the  poetry  of  nursing — the  writing  of  letters  for  some 
mysterious  nobleman  who  was  now  posing  as  a  common 
soldier,  and  who  should  make  this  beautiful  and  fashion- 
able nurse  his  confidante. 

Then,  again,  there  were  women  spies  and  women  trai- 
tors in  high  places  who  had  the  inside  track,  and  who 
sheltered  themselves  behind  their  sex. 

This  miserable  spy  business,  which  seems  one  of  the 
worst  horrors  of  war,  contaminating  him  who  gives  and 
him  who  takes,  was  amplified  and  most  terribly  compli- 
cated by  the  fact  that  the  daughters  and  wives  of  dis- 
tinguished Northern  generals  were  perhaps  Southern 
sympathizers  and  ready  to  betray  the  secrets  of  the 
ISTorthern  army.  There  was  one  such  who  gave  General 
McClellan  great  trouble.  She  was  graceful  and  winning. 
She  went  through  the  camps  learning  the  character  of 
army  officers ;  was  as  keen  and  sagacious  as  she  was 
winning,  and  was  a  favorite  with  all  men  of  mark.  And 
what  a  strange  time  it  was !  Who  knew  his  neighbor? 
Who  was  a  traitor  and  who  a  patriot?  The  hero  of 
to-day  was  the  suspected  of  to-morrow.  No  one  knew 
when  he  went  to  bed  whether  he  should  rise  a  general, 
or,  ceasing  to  be  anybody,  should  be  consigned  to  dis- 
grace and  the  Capitol  prison ;  for  our  great  War  Minister, 
possessed  of  strong  virtues,  was  also  arbitrary  and  vio- 
lent almost  to  a  fault. 

Through  many  such  a  maze  was  the  plain,  honest,  in- 


A   BALL   AT   THE   WHITE   HOUSE — PICNICS    IN    CAMP         93 

corruptible  soul  of  General  McClellan  bound  to  travel 
until  it  met  relief  in  action.  The  plans  of  the  array, 
however  carefully  prepared,  however  secretly  conceived, 
became  known  to  the  enemy  before  they  were  known  to 
the  President.  There  were  traitors  in  the  most  secret 
council  -  chambers.  Generals,  senators,  and  secretaries 
looked  at  each  other  with  suspicious  eyes.  At  length  a 
woman  discovered  one  traitor,  and  thus  another  was  un- 
masked ;  and  some  were  asked  to  cross  the  sea,  and  did 
so. 

I  think  history  has  not  sufficiently  emphasized  this 
distracting  element  in  our  early  warlike  days.  It  was 
inevitable,  perhaps,  in  a  civil  war,  when  father  and 
daughter,  and  husband  and  wife,  brother  and  sister,  were 
armed  against  each  other.  It  is  a  great  wonder  that  the 
city  of  Washington  was  not  betrayed,  burned,  destroyed 
a  half-dozen  times. 

The  scene  for  four  years  was  "  idyllic,  grotesque,  and 
barbaric,"  and  society  was  most  interesting.  The  stu- 
dent of  the  romantic  side  of  life  had  great  opportunities. 
Women  of  genius,  sparkle,  and  even  of  eccentricity  were 
sure  to  succeed.  Washington  society  has  always  de- 
manded less  and  given  more  than  any  society  in  this 
country — demanded  less  of  applause,  deference,  etiquette, 
and  has  accepted  as  current  coin  quick  wit,  appreciative 
tact,  and  a  talent  for  talking.  The  slender  figures  on 
horseback  of  the  pretty  women  made  the  Long  Bridge 
look  like  the  Row  in  London,  and  the  physical  exercise 
gave  them  splendid  color. 

Picnics  out  at  the  camps  were  the  fashion.  The  camp 
equipage,  tin  cups  and  plates,  knives  and  forks  of  the 
simplest.  Spartan  fare,  all  added  to  the  attraction  of  the 
feast,  and  as  all  cavalrymen  are  bound  to  be  dashing, 
one  or  two  such  were  always  at  the  head  of  the  feast, 


94  AN    EPISTLE   TO   POSTERITY 

pouring  sympathetic  and  most  dangerous  compliments 
into  the  ears  of  a  New  York  or  Philadelphia  belle.  It 
was  romance  in  its  concrete  form,  while  the  presence  of 
a  beautiful  woman  in  a  camp  has  been  decidedly  fasci- 
nating since  the  days  of  Antony  and  Cleopatra. 

The  cloud  was  so  dark  that  it  needed  all  the  bright 
lights  that  could  be  turned  upon  it.  But  for  four  years 
there  was  a  contagion  of  nobility  in  the  land,  and  the 
best  blood  l!^orth  and  South  poured  itself  out  a  libation 
to  propitiate  the  deities  of  Truth  and  Justice.  The  great 
sin  of  slavery  was  washed  out,  but  at  what  a  cost ! 

But  for  this  no  work  was  too  hard,  no  effort  too  great, 
no  sacrifice  too  sublime.  The  thinking  bayonets,  the 
men  fighting  for  an  idea  with  no  idea  of  conquest,  noth- 
ing to  gain,  facing  frightful  loss,  probable  death— ^such 
men  had  different  faces  from  the  ordinary  soldier.  As 
one  heard  them  chanting  their  hymns  to  the  accompani- 
ment of  iron  heels  and  clanking  bayonets  there  was  an 
expression  so  lofty,  so  touching,  that  no  one  who  has 
heard  it  will  ever  forget. 

And  the  day  after  was  a  bright  and  prosperous  one  in 
all  our  cities.  Equipages  dashed  out  in  foreign  liveries ; 
women  dressed  superbly ;  palaces  began  to  go  up  into 
the  air ;  I^^ew  York  looked  as  if  she  had  inherited  the 
wealth  of  the  Indies ;  and  so  she  had — on  paper. 

Pay-day  came  somewhat  later  on,  and  has  recurred 
frequently  since.  But  the  way  these  two  armies  melt- 
ed immediately  into  good  citizens,  how  they  took  up 
the  plough  and  the  hoe — that  is  the  strangest  and  the 
most  inexplicable  fact  of  all. 

During  the  years  after  the  war,  and  when  General 
Grant  had  become  President,  I  made  many  visits  to 
Washington ;  twice  to  the  hospitable  home  of  Governor 
Morgan,  whose  handsome  house  was  on  the  very  site 


THE    HIGH    JOINT   COMMISSION  95 

of  the  former  isolated  hut  where  my  negro  washer- 
woman had  lived  in  the  early  forties.  Washington 
grew  like  a  gourd  in  the  night,  and  was  then  fast  be- 
coming what  it  is  now,  the  most  beautiful  of  cities. 

Sir  Edward  Thornton  was  the  English  Minister ;  the 
Hon.  Hamilton  Fish  was  Secretary  of  State,  and  his 
dear  accomplished  wife  was  filling  her  place  as  it  has 
seldom  been  filled.  I  saw  the  High  Joints  (as  they 
were  facetiously  called)  in  all  their  glory  at  her  house 
at  a  party — Sir  Stafford  Northcote,  Earl  de  Grey,  etc. 
The  High  Joint  Commission  presented  a  noble  list  of 
names  on  both  sides.  One  of  the  most  agreeable  men 
at  Washington  at  this  time,  and  for  many  years  after, 
was  the  Hon.  Henry  B.  Anthony,  of  Rhode  Island,  a 
dear  friend,  a  polished  and  cultivated  man. 


CHAPTER  YI 

Some  Memories  of  Distinguished  People— The  New  England  Literati 
—  Mrs.  Sigourney  and  Miss  Sedgwick  —  Dr.  Bellows  and  the 
Transcendentalists — Mr.  Bryant's  Dinners — Recollections  of  Booth 
— The  lago  Dress  —  Chief- Justice  Chase  —  Sherman  and  Grant 
— Adelaide  Ristori. 

In  many  visits  to  Hartford,  which  beautiful  city  was 
the  joy  of  my  girlhood,  I  met  Mrs.  Sigourney — the 
sweet,  calm  Mrs.  Barbauld  of  our  early  verse,  and  a 
dear  woman.  She  was  Hartford's  first  litterateur^  to  be 
followed  by  such  eminent  stars  as  Mrs.  Stowe,  Charles 
Dudley  Warner,  Mark  Twain,  and  I  do  not  know  how 
many  more.  Miss  Sedgwick,  Mrs.  Anne  S.  Stephens, 
and  Mrs.  Sigourney  were  the  most  read  and  talked  of 
of  our  authoresses  of  that  day.  Mrs.  Stephens's  Fashion 
and  Famine,  in  which  was  pictured  Mrs.  Coventry  Wad- 
dell's  curious  house  on  the  top  of  Murray  Hill,  sur- 
rounded by  unoccupied  lots  (and  which  bore  the  strong 
and  useful  suggestion  for  the  subsequent  helping  of  the 
poor  so  admirably  carried  out  by  Miss  Schuyler),  was 
the  novel  of  the  day.  Miss  Sedgwick  was  a  most  dis- 
tinguished woman.  Her  novel  Hope  Leslie  had  been 
the  first  New  England  success,  and  she  was  the  idol 
of  the  most  agreeable  and  successful  of  all  the  great 
brother  -  and  -  sister  families,  the  Lenox  Sedgwicks,  who 
were  to  be  followed  by  the  Dwights  and  the  Fields, 
all  Berkshire  County  people  of  that  day.  Mrs.  Kobert 
Sedgwick  was  one  of  the  entertainers  of  the  literary 
and  fashionable  sets  as  they  commingled  when  I  first 


THE   BEGINNING   OF   THE   SANITARY    COMMISSION  97 

came  to  J^ew  York  to  live.  It  was  there  that  I  first 
met  Bryant  and  Dr.  Bellows  and  the  illuminati  gen- 
erally. Her  four  charming  daughters,  her  handsome 
son,  Ellery  Sedgwick,  and  their  celebrated  "  Aunt  Cath- 
arine," with  Mrs.  Sedgwick's  wit  and  hospitality,  drew 
all  around  her.  It  was  a  home  to  the  somewhat  lonely 
3"oung  woman,  who  had  not  then  found  her  place.  Dr. 
Lieber,  the  great  philosopher,  was  there  sometimes. 
Dr.  Bellows  was  the  delightful  and  genial  talker  of 
the  group.  Who  could,  who  ever  can,  describe  his 
fascinating  talk?  His  sermons  were  models  of  pul- 
pit eloquence;  the  mantle  of  Channing  fell  on  his 
shoulders,  but  it  was  the  every-day  charm  which  was 
his  attraction.  Genial,  delightful,  scholarly,  always  in 
a  fine  Sydney  Smith  humor,  he  poured  out  his  deepest, 
wisest,  best  thoughts  with  prodigal  lavishness;  then 
would  come  wild,  witty,  airy  fancies  and  sweet  serious- 
ness, and  facts  that  could  scald  like  tears.  Whatever 
mood  he  was  in,  whatever  part  of  your  character  he 
wished  to  impress,  his  eloquence  was  always  to  be  de- 
pended upon.  ]S"o  one  wished  to  argue  any  point  he 
had  taken ;  he  carried  all  before  him. 

His  sermons  were  infinitely  inspiring  and  useful ;  his 
talk  was  a  celestial  recreation ;  he  was  funny  as  well  as 
witty,  and  behind  all  there  was  a  good,  hard,  New  Eng- 
land common-sense.  When  he  and  his  associates,  Dr. 
Agnew,  George  T.  Strong,  etc.,  took  up  the  Sanitary 
Commission,  this  latter  qualification  made  him  the  su- 
perbly successful  organizer  and  useful  man  that  he  proved 
to  be.  At  his  house  what  assemblages  of  humorists  and 
philanthropists  and  talkers  I  have  met !  —  George  L. 
Schuyler,  Hoppin,  Bryant,  Tuckerman,  Bancroft,  Peter 
Cooper,  Washington  Irving,  Fitz-Greene  Halleck,  George 
William  Curtis,  and  all  the  artists.    Those  delightful 

7 


98  AN   EPISTLE   TO   POSTERITY 

daughters  of  Mr.  James  A.  Hamilton,  Mrs.  Schuyler  and 
Miss  Mary  Morris  Hamilton,  Mrs.  Kirkland  (the  first 
of  our  female  humoristic  writers,  author  of  A  New  Home, 
Whdll  Follow  f\  Parke  Godwin,  Willis  Gay  lord  Clark, 
Huntington,  Frothingham,  Lewis  Lang,  Dr.  Osgood,  and 
so  on,  met  at  his  house ;  their  names  escape  me,  the 
list  is  so  long.  Dr.  Bellows's  wit-combats  with  Mrs. 
Frances  Anne  Kemble  were  kept  up  twenty  years,  each 
giving  the  other  friendly  little  pats ;  and  no  one  enjoyed 
her  witty  retorts  more  than  he  did,  although  perhaps 
his  ears  tingled. 

Dr.  Bellows's  life  was  a  great  part  of  ]^ew  York, 
and  of  the  war  it  was  the  bright  and  illuminated 
page.  Why  does  not  some  one  write  it?  "What  a 
book  it  would  be!  I  suppose  his  administration  of 
the  Sanitary  Commission  w^ould  read  like  a  romance 
now  —  alas,  how  much  of  it  I  saw !  and  some  of  it 
I  was. 

I  cannot  remember  when  Dr.  Bellows  began  to  be 
a  bright  star  in  my  life.  We  were  neighbors  in  the 
country,  and  he  often  took  my  mother's  tea.  Many  old 
associations  continued  to  draw  us  together  until  his  la- 
mented death  ;  and  now  that  he  is  a  brilliant  memory  I 
often  find  myself  referring  to  that  excellent  example  of 
undying  cheerfulness,  that  patience  in  which  he  excelled 
all  his  peers.  Dr.  Bellows  was  a  fortunate  man  out- 
wardly; he  was  always  first  in  ever}^  circle;  he  had 
enjoyed  a  great  deal  of  the  luxurious  happiness  of 
travel ;  the  world  was  full  of  beautiful  places  for  him 
to  be  happy  in,  for  he  made  every  day  a  holiday 
for  all  around  him.  He  found  that  the  bliss  of  a  spirit 
was  in  action ;  he  worked  hard ;  but  he  had  a  great 
many  grievous  trials,  for  which  he  wore  the  armor  of 
a  Christian  spirit.    There  could  be  no  enlargement  of 


EARLY    TRANSCENDENTALISM  99 

such  a  horizon  except  in  eternity.  It  was  a  model 
life. 

Living  with  him  at  one  time  w^ere  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Oc- 
tavius  B.  Frothingham,  and  they  added  a  great  charm 
to  that  pretty  rectory,  corner  of  Twenty-first  Street  and 
Fourth  Avenue,  of  which  one  of  the  doctor's  witty  broth- 
ers-in-law, Mr.  Fred  Kevins,  said  that  it  was  too  hand- 
some for  a  "dissenting  minister."  Mr.  Frothinghara's 
Avit,  eloquence,  and  peculiar  belief  drew  around  him  a 
set  of  worshippers  of  his  own;' he  had  for  many  years 
a  large  following.  His  excellent  compendium  Tran- 
scendentalism  in  New  England  is  a  most  valuable  book, 
being  a  thoughtful,  scholarly  history  of  that  strange, 
mystical  liberalizing  of  religious  thought  which  swept 
over  New  England  for  forty  years,  doing  much  good 
and  ver}^  little  harm.  It  brought  out  such  men  as 
Theodore  Parker,  C.  A.  Bartol,  John  Weiss,  the  younger 
Channing,  James  Freeman  Clarke.  Emerson  may  be 
said  to  have  been  its  Luther. 

Dr.  Washburn  used  to  say  of  these  transcend entalists, 
"  They  opened  a  w^indow  and  let  in  a  fresh  breeze,  cleans- 
ing the  close  garret  of  New  England  theology."  This 
from  a  churchman  w^as  great  praise,  but  Dr.  Washburn 
could  afford  it.  He  w^as  one  of  the  great  lights  of  the 
Church. 

I  am  amused  to  remember  now  how  much  of  m}^  read- 
ing, when  I  was  very  young,  was  polemical.  It  w^as  not 
intolerant,  for  I  was  surrounded  by  those  transcendental 
philosophers.  Articles  by  Colenso,  Arnold,  Temple  (now 
Archbishop  of  Canterbury),  Stanley,  the  Tracts  for  the 
Times,  Pusey  and  Newman,  elbowed  Carlyle,  Goethe, 
and  Schleiermacher,  Words w^orth,  Southey,  Byron,  and 
Coleridge,  with  the  oncoming  dessert  of  Thackeray  and 
Dickens,  who  are  not  polemical.     Fortunately  for  me,  I 


100  AN    EPISTLE   TO   POSTERITY 

had  a  Shakespeare-loving  father,  and  a  mother  who  read 
poetry  aloud  Avith  a  sweet  intonation.  I  knew  all  the 
Lake  poets  earl}^,  and  my  "  polemical "  reading  was  much 
lightened  by  Childe  Harold  and  Coleridge  and  Keats. 
I  miss  now  very  much  that  love  of  poetry  which  was  so 
common  among  the  young  girls  of  fifty  years  ago.  In- 
deed, I  miss  also  the  poets.  In  fact,  we  all  read  ver}^ 
much,  beginning  with  Jane  Taylor's  Poems  for  Infant 
Minds,  and  including  Thaldba  and  The  Ancient  Mariner, 

And  yet  so  illy  directed,  so  carelessly  done,  was  all 
this  reading  that  I  once  shocked  Dr.  Bellows  by  telling 
him  I  had  never  read  Comus  or  Milton's  prose.  How  soon 
he  repaired  that  omission  by  reading  Comus  aloud  to 
us  in  a  masterly  manner,  and  following  it  up  by  giving 
us  readings  from,  and  almost  a  lecture  on,  "Wordsworth 
when  he  was  paying  us  a  visit  at  Keene !  Society  is 
like  a  Cremona  violin ;  those  who  play  upon  it  decide 
that  the  old  ones  are  incomparable.  '^  A  crowd  is  not 
company,  faces  are  but  galleries  of  pictures,  and  talk  is 
but  a  tinkling  cymbal  where  there  is  no  love."  "  But 
there  was  then  love  and  liking."  Where  society  is 
founded  on  the  provision  that  people  know  each  other 
well  and  like  each  other,  it  certainly  follows  that  there 
should  be  more  "  love,"  or  liking  at  least,  than  where  it 
is  merely  a  matter  of  display.  When  society  is  bought 
it  is  apt  to  lose  the  distinction  and  the  value  of  the 
company  of  such  men  as  Dr.  Bellows,  if,  indeed,  there 
are  many  such. 

Certainly  the  individual  was  then  of  more  conse- 
quence than  his  surroundings.  There  was  less  luxury 
and  much  more  conservatism  thirty,  and  even  twenty, 
years  ago.  Dr.  Bellows  played  his  noble  part  both  be- 
fore and  after  the  war  with  singular  distinction.  He 
had  the  courage  of  his  convictions.    It  was  not  an  easy 


MR.  Bryant's  DiNiJEits,  •  — ^  .-.  -lOl 

berth  which  he  filled  during  thB  war,  for..t,he.2'egular. 
army  was  always  against  him.  Gtetiorhl  Siiei-mdii  iie-ver 
spoke  well  of  the  Sanitary  Commission.  He  thought 
the  whole  business  of  taking  care  of  a  war  belonged  to 
the  regular  army.  So  it  did,  if  they  could  have  done  it; 
but  they  could  not.  So  it  was  well  that  some  outside  aid 
brought  a  cup  of  cold  water  to  the  dying  soldier. 

Dr.  Bellows  was  fortunate  in  having  for  parishioners 
Mr.  Bryant,  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Bancroft,  Mr.  and  Mrs.  G.  L. 
Schuyler,  Mr.  Henry  T.  Tuck^rman,  and  many  such 
people. 

Mr.  Bryant,  unlike  most  poets,  was  a  rich  man,  and 
gave  excellent  dinners.  I  remember  many  a  distin- 
guished company  in  his  house  in  Sixteenth  Street, 
charmingly  conducted  by  his  daughter.  Miss  Julia 
Bryant,  who  knew  how  to  mingle  the  elements  which 
make  up  a  dinner. 

I  often  thought  that  his  dinners  might  be  compared 
to  Kogers's  breakfasts  in  London,  so  many  bright  minds 
conspired  to  make  them  eloquent.  Mr.  Bryant  and  his 
son-in-law,  Parke  Godwin,  were  kind  to  actors,  then  not 
so  often  invited  into  society  as  they  are  now ;  and  at 
their  houses  I  met  Edwin  Booth  and  his  first  lovely 
wife.  Badeau  and  Booth  were  very  intimate,  and  the 
former  brought  the  great  tragic  actor  often  to  my 
house.  I  never  saw  a  more  perfect  union  than  that  of 
the  Booths. 

I  remember  Booth  was  then  playing  Othello  and  lago 
on  alternate  nights.  A  select  few  of  us  preferred  his 
Othello.  It  was  so  intensely  Venice  in  all  its  belong- 
ings that  it  fitted  his  romantic  Eastern  beauty.  I  re- 
member no  picture  more  vividly  than  his  as  he  sat  on  a 
couch  reading  over  his  military  orders,  the  great  captain 
Othello,  in  an  Oriental  robe  and  sash.    And  then,  as 


103  A]S':  S:p):stle  to  posterity 

JagQ  begins -subtly  to  instil  the  poison,  the  careless- 
ness* wi  tit  wfeich  OVhello  heard  the  first  suggestion  that 
Cassio  had  played  him  false;  how,  half  sighing,  and 
turning  over  his  despatches  as  if  he  wished  those  lazy 
days  to  return,  he  said,  "  Oh  yes,  he  went  between  us 
very  often."  The  temperament  of  the  actor,  the  dress, 
all  fitted  him  nobly  in  this  part ;  but  his  lago  continued 
to  be  the  world's  favorite,  and  I  once  asked  him  the 
reason. 

"  Oh,"  said  he,  "my  wife  dressed  me  so  well  for  that 
part;  she  composed  and  made  that  dress."  It  was  a 
superb  dress  of  scarlet  with  pearl  buttons  running  down 
the  jacket.  They  looked  like  bullets ;  there  was  a  hid- 
den ferocity  in  that  dress.  Thomas  Hicks  painted  a 
great  picture  of  him  in  it. 

Booth's  rare  smile  was  most  effective  in  Othello.  As 
he  heard  Desdemona  tell  her  love,  it  broke  over  his  face 
like  a  gleam  of  sunshine  on  a  dark  day. 

I  saw  his  Hamlet  many  times.  It  was  almost  our 
only  amusement  in  the  first  days  of  the  war  (he  played 
it  a  hundred  times  in  one  season).  He  was  the  ideal 
mad  prince.  As  some  one  said  afterwards  of  Irving's 
Hamlet,  "  You  forgot  the  player  and  thought  only  of 
the  prince."  His  reading  in  this  part  was  the  best  thing 
he  did.  He  was  again  most  wonderful  with  Barrett 
and  Bangs  in  Julius  Ccesar.  He  was  the  very  best  Car- 
dinal Wolsey  I  have  ever  seen ;  how  grand  and  old  he 
Avas !  But  oh !  his  King  Lear !  To  have  heard  Mrs. 
Kemble  read  that  play  and  to  see  Booth  play  it  was  the 
very  poetry  of  despair. 

Like  all  geniuses,  he  did  things  of  which  he  was  un- 
aware himself.  The  expression  on  Lear's  face  in  his  last 
wild  moments,  the  gleam  of  recognition,  the  pleased 
memory,  the  joy  of  being  still  loved,  the  gratitude — to 


EECOLLECTIONS    OF   BOOTH  103 

be  immediately  chased  away  by  the  wild  torments  of 
insanity  —  I  declare  I  never  could  see  that  expression 
that  the  tears  did  not  rain  down  ray  face. 

And  yet,  like  his  fellow-genius  General  Grant,  who  at 
that  same  moment  was  playing  his  role  so  extremely 
well  on  a  distant  battle-field,  he  was  no  talker  and  no 
orator ;  he  could  not,  or  he  would  not,  talk  about  his 
parts  or  about  Shakespeare. 

He  said  of  his  Othello  that  it  was  only  a  sketch,  and 
he  rather  laughed  at  its  being  a  good  one.  He  liked  later 
on  to  be  praised  for  his  Hamlet  and  his  Cardinal  Wol- 
sey  and  his  Petruchio ;  he  said  he  was  satisfied  with 
those  impersonations. 

He  failed  utterly  as  Eomeo;  and  when  his  theatre 
burned  down  and  he  was  temporarily  ruined,  of  all  his 
wardrobe  nothing  was  left  but  one  shoe  of  Romeo's, 
"  left  for  me  to  kick  myself  with,"  he  said. 

I  never  met  him  after  those  days  of  his  youth  and 
beauty  in  society.  He  became  more  famous,  and  was  al- 
ways much  liked  and  respected ;  but  I  am  glad  to  keep 
apart  my  little  vision  of  him  at  this  period  when  he  w^as 
a  dream,  the  realization  of  what  Shakespeare  might 
have  seen  with  his  mind's  eye.  He  was  an  exquisitely 
refined  person,  and  had  an  air  of  sadness  and  preoccu- 
pation even  then.  The  sadness  of  those  days,  the  misery 
which  the  assassination  of  Lincoln  brought  upon  us  all, 
my  own  private  grief  at  the  time,  induce  me  to  skip 
much  that  would  be  historical.  It  has,  however,  had  the 
advantage  of  a  thousand  pens — that  dreadful  epoch 
during  and  just  after  the  war. 

I  must  notice  one  little  book.  I  dare  say  the  gifted 
author  has  forgotten  that  he  ever  wrote  it. 

It  was  Whitelaw  Reid's  account  of  a  Tour  in  the 
South  with  Chief -Justice  Chase  in  1866.     The  learned 


104  AN   EPISTLE   TO   POSTERITY 

author,  destined  later  on  to  become  an  editor  and  a  for- 
eign minister,  was  then  favorably  known  as  "  Agate,"  a 
correspondent  of  the  Cincinnati  Goinmercial.  The  vigor 
dnd  vivacity  of  his  style  had  already  made  him  a  great 
favorite,  but  this  little  brochure  probably  answered 
more  questions  and  satisfied  more  people  at  the  North 
than  many  a  more  ambitious  volume.  He  travelled 
with  the  Chief -Justice  to  ]^ew  Orleans  and  across  to 
Charleston,  saw  the  returned  Confederate  officers,  all  of 
whom  said  "  they  were  going  to  get  some  new  clothes  " ; 
questioned  the  negro,  and  found  out  what  every  one  at 
the  North  wished  to  know  (it  had  been  a  terrible  dread), 
that  there  was  no  danger  of  a  negro  insurrection ;  in 
fact,  he  opened  for  us  the  long-closed  South.  This  rare 
pamphlet  is,  perhaps,  as  important  historically  as  it  was 
useful  at  the  time. 

Chief-Justice  Chase  was  born  in  New  Hampshire,  and 
my  father  had  bought  the  ground  on  which  our  home 
was  built  of  his  grandmother,  old  Mrs.  Janet  Ealston, 
who  lived  in  Keene,  a  shrewd  Scotchwoman.  When 
my  father  said  to  her,  "Mrs.  Ealston,  you  ask  too  much 
for  this  land,"  she  answered,  wittily,  "Ah,  Mr.  Wilson, 
I  notice  no  people  gits  enough  for  their  land  but  those 
who  asks  enough  for  it ";  and  she  got  her  price. 

My  father,  when  rusticated  from  Middlebury  College 
for  some  boyish  pranks,  kept  the  village  school  in  Keene 
for  one  winter,  and  used  to  carry  a  little  light-haired  boy 
on  his  shoulder  to  school  through  the  snow.  This  boy's 
name  was  Salmon  P.  Chase.  He  wrote  it  largely  on  the 
history  of  his  times,  and  when  in  after-days  we  used  to 
meet  at  Washington,  and  he  was  everything  that  was 
distinguished,  he  always  remembered  this  early  friend- 
ship and  treated  me  almost  as  if  I  were  a  relative. 

As  Mr.  Evarts  said  of  him,  "he  was  always  one  of 


CHIEF-JUSTICE   CHASE  105 

the  first  three."  A  very  sweet-natured  man,  I  think  he 
never  was  happy  as  Chief -Justice.  He  would  have  pre- 
ferred to  be  President,  as  we  all  hoped  he  would  be. 

With  his  two  beautiful  and  gifted  daughters,  Mr. 
Chase,  whether  Minister,  Secretary,  or  Chief -Justice, 
always  kept  open  a  delightful  house,  and  until  his  health 
failed  he  was  a  great  pleasure  to  meet.  He  had  the 
canny  Scot  in  him,  as  his  grandmother  had.  It  gave  a 
unique  flavor  to  his  wit,  and  shone  in  and  out  behind  his 
remarkable  genius  for  affairs  in  .that  public  service  for 
which  he  was  so  essentially  suited. 

I  went  to  see  him  in  his  last  days  in  ISTew  York,  where 
he  was  under  treatment  for  some  nervous  malady,  and 
he  talked  of  Keene  as  if  nothing  had  intervened.  "  My 
tall  schoolmaster,"  he  said,  "  was  the  most  fascinating 
person  I  have  ever  met.  I  felt  a  great  confidence  that 
he  would  not  drop  me  into  the  snow.  I  have  not  always 
felt  that  same  confidence  in  men  since." 

I  suppose  that  this  great  man  tasted  the  insincerity  of 
human  friendship  and  the  ups  and  downs  of  fortune  and 
the  instability  of  fame  as  few  men  ever  did,  unless  we 
may  except  James  G.  Blaine,  Daniel  Webster,  Henry 
Clay,  and  Samuel  J.  Tilden,  all  of  whom  had  the  Presi- 
dency within  their  grasp,  but  it  slipped  away.  And  yet 
how  often  the  Presidency  has  simply  meant  that  a  man 
shall  be  abused,  distrusted,  and  worked  to  death  while 
lie  is  filling  the  great  office,  and  that  he  should  drop  into 
unmerited  oblivion  when  he  has  left  the  White  House 
(General  Grant  alone  excepted) !  But,  then,  his  fame  was 
kept  dear  by  the  people.  He  could  not  travel  through 
the  remotest  village  that  the  farmer  would  not  leave  the 
plough  in  the  furrow,  and  run  for  wife  and  children  to 
come  and  see  the  man  who  had  saved  the  nation.  Even 
to  touch  his  hand  was  distinction. 


106  AN   EPISTLE   TO   POSTERITY 

Indeed,  even  after  the  war  was  over,  the  most  inter- 
esting personage  to  us  all  was  General  Grant,  who,  of 
all  people,  hated  to  be  interviewed,  and  who  would  not 
be  exploited.  He  was  no  talker,  and  unless  he  was 
strongly  interested  in  or  excited  about  his  subject,  he 
was  deficient  in  fluency ;  and  yet  every  new  acquaint- 
ance found  him  remarkable  for  the  transparent  lucidity 
of  his  explanations,  and  he  had  a  good  command  of  ner- 
vous English ;  so,  as  we  all  knew  that  he  had  talent 
enough,  the  natural  inference  was  that  General  Grant 
did  not  wish  to  talk.  When  he  did  talk  it  was  therefore 
taken  as  a  great  compliment  to  the  listener. 

What  a  contrast  to  him  was  General  Sherman,  one  of 
the  most  renowned  talkers  that  ever  lived !  He  had  an 
immense  command  of  words,  almost  volubility,  and  the 
most  friendly  willingness  to  talk  of  his  campaigns.  This 
soldier  by  nature,  who  had  an  entire  scorn  of  luxury  or 
even  comfort  on  the  field,  slept  in  a  tente  d''abri^  or  in 
the  open  air,  and  had  no  cumbrous  baggage.  His  menage 
was  a  roll  of  blankets  and  a  haversack  full  of  hardtack. 
He  declared  that  he  could  fall  asleep  on  the  hard  floor 
or  wet  ground,  or  when  a  battle  was  raging  near  him. 
Attention  to  detail,  promptitude,  decision,  order,  and 
unfailing  punctuality  were  part  of  him,  and  yet  his 
rugged  face  could  unbend  in  society,  wear  a  most  win- 
ning expression ;  and  he  loved  the  theatre,  all  amuse- 
ments, and  a  good  dinner.  I  never  knew  any  carpet- 
knight  who  could  wait  for  a  tard\"  lady  who  had  for- 
gotten her  fan  so  patiently  as  he  could.  He  was  a 
many-sided  man  and  a  perfect  gentleman. 

He  became  renowned  as  an  orator,  and  his  speeches 
at  West  Point  were  the  most  perfect  specimens  of  that 
difficult  art  —  the  talking  to  young  men  without  pat- 


SHEEMAN   AND   GRANT  107 

These  two  great  friends,  great  military  geniuses,  who 
were  so  true  to  each  other  and  so  free  from  any  jealousy 
that  they  could  write  two  such  letters  to  each  other  as 
those  of  March  4,  1864,  from  Grant  to  Sherman,  dated 
]S"ashville,  Tennessee,  and  answered  by  Sherman  March 
10, 1864  (every  school-boy  should  learn  them  by  heart); 
these  two  great  men,  of  all  our  heroes — one  a  President, 
the  other  a  lieutenant-general — seem  to  have  escaped 
that  almost  universal  concomitant  of  greatness,  ingrati- 
tude and  lack  of  constancy  on  the  part  of  the  fickle  public. 

General  Grant's  tour  around  the  world  made  him  so 
replete  with  delightful  reminiscence  that  he  talked  more 
when  he  came  home.  I  remember  dining  with  him  at 
Governor  Cornell's  in  New  York,  and  it  was  a  very  dis- 
tinguished dinner.  I  told  him  that  an  English  officer 
wiio  had  been  present  at  the  dinner  given  him  by  the 
Duke  of  Wellington  in  the  Waterloo  Chamber  told  me 
in  London  that  he  thought  him  a  very  learned  soldier. 
"Well,  I  am  not,"  said  Grant.  "I  had  neither  the 
genius  of  Sherman  nor  the  learning  of  Lee  or  Mac- 
pherson.     I  mily  meant  to  get  tJiereP 

But  the  fountain  of  talk  was  unsealed  on  this  occasion, 
and  he  told  me  of  his  travels  in  China  and  Japan,  of  the 
wonderful  men  he  had  met  everj^ where,  and  the  dinner 
with  the  Queen,  of  which  ho  said, "  I  did  not  sit  next  to 
her,  as  I  expected  to  j  she  had  a  prince  and  a  princess 
between  us,  but  she  was  very  agreeable,  and  talked 
across.  Better  than  all,"  said  he,  "I  had  Fred  with  me 
everywhere."  The  affectionate  tone  of  this  delightful 
character,  the  simplicity  mingled  with  greatness,  made 
General  Grant  the  idol  of  the  people.  His  entrance 
into  a  city  made  a  gala  da3\  "  Celebrity  is  the  chastise- 
ment of  talent  and  the  punishment  of  genius."  I  think 
he  never  liked  it. 


108  AN    EPISTLE   TO    POSTERITY 

"  I  can't  talk  like  Sherman,"  he  used  to  say,  with  his 
rare  smile ;  and,  indeed,  nobody  could. 

I  happened  to  see  him  twice  when  his  character  shone 
out  free  of  adventitious  circumstances.  The  first  time 
was  at  West  Point,  just  after  the  w^ar  was  ended,  in 
1865.  He  came  to  his  old  Alma  Mater,  bringing  Mrs. 
Grant,  w^ithout  whom  life  had  no  charm  for  him.  We 
were  in  the  library.  The  examination  was  going  on, 
and  Professor  Bartlett  left  the  room,  coming  back  with 
Grant  on  his  arm.  What  an  intense  moment  it  was  to 
us  all!  The  professors  rose  to  receive  him.  I  think 
poor  General  Grant  nearly  sank  through  the  floor ;  he 
winced  as  he  never  had  done  in  the  face  of  the  enemy. 
^'  Those  dreaded  professors  rising  to  do  me  honor !  Why, 
I  felt  all  the  cadet  terror  all  over  me,"  he  afterwards 
said.  He  was  more  comfortable  when  he  got  outside 
and  commenced  shaking  hands  with  all  mankind  and 
womankind,  but  no  one  who  saw  that  notable  scene  can 
forget  his  modesty. 

Again  I  happened  to  be  in  Washington  during  his 
second  term  of  oiSce,  and  with  my  husband  and  son 
took  the  boat  for  Mount  Yernon.  To  our  delight  and 
surprise,  General  and  Mrs.  Grant,  Miss  JST ellie  Grant,  and 
Miss  Edith  Fish  were  on  board,  the  two  latter  young 
school-girls  of  seventeen. 

When  we  reached  Mount  Yernon,  finding  the  Presi- 
dent was  expected,  we  tried  to  efface  ourselves,  but  Gen- 
eral Grant  asked  us  to  dine  with  him,  and  especially 
drank  wine  with  my  young  son,  the  youngest  member 
of  the  party.  Nothing  could  be  so  kind  as  he  was,  and 
after  dinner,  as  we  sat  looking  at  the  Potomac,  Mrs. 
Grant  said,  "  Oh  !  I  w^ish  I  had  a  house  on  the  Potomac!" 
"  Do  you  ?"  said  he.  "  Well,  I  can  buy  one  cheap." 
Then  they  had  their  little  badinage  about  the  improb- 


ADELAIDE   BISTOEI  109 

ability  of  their  paying  for  their  purchase  out  of  their 
crops,  etc.  We  came  home  together,  of  course,  and  al- 
though I  saw  him  often,  both  at  the  White  House  and 
at  great  dinners,  and  much  in  private  life  after,  I  re- 
member General  Grant  best  on  these  two  occasions. 
He  was  gifted  by  nature  with  a  genius  for  military 
command,  but  he  had  also  the  unmetaphysical  character 
of  the  Roman  intellect,  and  in  his  private  life  he  was 
all  that  was  sweetest.  While  Sherman  was  a  Greek, 
with  the  wit,  tact,  quickness,  an(J  elegance  of  the  Greek 
mind,  yet  these  two  great  captains  loved  each  other  and 
understood  each  other,  and  were  alike  heroes  worthy 
to  save  the  sinking  ship  of  State,  good  husbands,  fond 
fathers,  and  citizens  of  high  renown.  Sherman's  sensi- 
tive and  impressionable  mind  got  him  into  trouble  occa- 
sionally, and  he  never  wished  to  be  President.  It  was 
fortunate  for  him  that  he  did  not  have  that  "  bee  in  his 
bonnet,"  as  old  General  Greene,  of  Rhode  Island,  used 
to  call  the  desire  for  the  Presidency. 

Adelaide  Ristori  brought  letters  to  me  when  she  came 
to  New  York  (in  1866  I  think  it  was)  from  my  friend 
Charles  Hale,  then  our  Minister  to  Egypt. 

Virtue,  beauty,  and  genius  were  this  woman's  title- 
deeds  to  fame,  and,  as  one  of  her  poetical  biographers 
said  justly,  "  Romance  presided  over  her  birth,  and  her 
path  was  strewn  with  as  many  incidents  as  flowers." 

She  brought  her  noble  husband,  Capranica,  and  her 
two  children,  the  beautiful  Bianca  and  her  son,  with 
her;  and  she  also  brought  us  Myrrha,  Gamma,  Medea, 
Lady  Macbeth,  Elizabeth,  Mary  Stuart,  Pia  dei  Tolomei, 
and  Adrienne  Lecouvreur.  When  first  asked  to  add 
Medea  to  her  repertoire,  she  at  first  said  no ;  that  she 
could  understand  all  passions  but  that  which  led  to  the 
murder  of  one's  offspring.    In  the  original,  Medea  mur- 


110  AN   EPISTLE   TO   POSTEKITY 

ders  her  children  savagely  before  the  audience,  but, 
owing  to  Eistori's  reluctance,  Legouve,  the  author,  al- 
tered his  situations  so  that  the  murder  is  implied  rather 
than  consummated,  and  she  made  the  great  tragedy  one 
of  her  successes. 

She  was  a  beautiful  woman,  of  the  dark-eyed  Italian 
type,  a  large  nose,  and  the  most  perfect  figure.  I  re- 
member her  dancing  the  german  at  a  ball  at  Mrs. 
Roosevelt's  (who  was  one  of  the  most  distinguished 
hostesses  of  the  period)  quite  as  well  as  the  youngest 
debutante,  and  a  most  serene  and  unaflPected  person  she 
was,  fond  of  talking  and  disposed  to  be  communicative 
about  herself.  She  told  me  that  she  was  the  daughter 
of  poor  actors,  who  happened  to  be  at  a  little  Yenetian 
city,  Cividale  del  Friuli,  when  she  entered  on  the  re- 
sponsibilities of  life ;  and  at  two  months  of  age  she  was 
brought  on  the  stage  in  a  basket  in  the  play  The  New 
Year's  Gift,  while  at  four  years  of  age  "La  Piccola 
Eistori"  appeared  in  a  child's  part  as  an  infant  phe- 
nomenon. Even  then  her  salary  was  greater  than  that 
of  her  parents.  As  a  girl  she  inherited  from  her  father 
a  great  love  of  music,  and  Nature  gave  her  a  mezzo- 
soprano  voice  of  the  finest  quality.  She  was  good 
enough  to  sit  down  to  the  piano  and  accompany  herself 
while  singing  me  some  of  the  very  interesting  Italian 
popular  songs  of  the  people.  But  her  grandmother,  a 
■fine  old  tragic  actress,  probably  seeing  the  genius  for 
acting  strong  in  the  child,  used  to  take  away  her  guitar 
and  shut  her  up  in  a  trunk,  "  d  la  Ginevra,"  when  she 
sang ;  so  she  was  quietly  ruled  out  from  being  a  singer. 
This  threw  her  into  a  deep  melancholy,  and  she  would 
only  play  with  her  dolls  as  dead  bodies,  laying  them  out 
and  surrounding  them  with  candles.  This  gloomy 
amusement  she  followed  up  by  a  passionate  attachment 


ADELAIDE    RTSTORI  111 

to  burying-grounds,  and  she  ascribed  some  of  her  deep 
and  tragic  powers  to  this  early  heart-break. 

She  became  very  religious,  and  while  performing  in 
Faenza,  in  1841,  she  was  so  devout  that  the  people 
thought  her  a  budding  angel  or  an  incipient  saint ;  they 
mounted  a  ladder  and  looked  in  on  her  midnight  vigils, 
but  only  found  that  she  had  thrown  herself  on  her  bed 
in  her  clothes.  However,  they  felt  such  faith  in  her 
future  canonization  that  they  divided  one  of  her  dresses, 
which  she  had  left  behind  her,  as  a  relic.  At  fourteen  she 
was  playing  Francesca  da  Rimini,  so  tall  and  thin  that 
she  had  to  be  padded — ''  cotonnee,^'  as  she  said — to  look 
like  a  woman.  She  worked  incessantly  under  a  fine  old 
actress,  who  was  most  severe  with  her.  She  worked 
until  she  broke  down.  She  got  well,  however,  and  in 
1842  began  to  create  parts  as  a  comedienne.  As  a  de- 
lineator of  the  romantic  drama,  in  Goldoni's  master- 
pieces, she  held  the  stage  until  1848  in  all  the  great 
cities  of  Italy.  Mr.  Lowell  saw  her  in  one  of  these 
years,  and  could  never  forget  the  charm  of  her  comedy, 
especially  in  Gli  Innamorati. 

But  she  went  to  Eome,  and  the  young  Giuliano  del 
Grillo,  son  and  heir  to  the  old  Marchese  Capranica,  fell 
in  love  with  her,  and  her  own  tragedy  began.  She  was 
of  humble  origin  and  an  actress,  so  the  old  marchese 
would  have  none  of  her.  It  was  most  amusing  to  hear 
her  describe  her  beautiful  youthful  lover,  and  then  turn 
to  look  at  the  fat,  elderly,  exceedingly  comfortable  Del 
Grillo  husband  by  her  side. 

Rome  was  beside  itself  with  revolutionary  ideas  in 
1846.  The  young  Giulano  was  watched ;  the  spies  were 
thick;  but  love  laughs  at  locksmiths.  They  met  and 
Tvere  married  at  Cascina,  whither  Del  Grillo  went  as  a 
Papal  envoy. 


113  AN   EPISTLE   TO   POSTEIilTY 

She  could  play  in  I  Promessi  Sjposi  with  a  vim  after 
this.     They  remained  faithful  to  each  other  until  death. 

The  young  wife  retired  from  the  stage  for  a  year  to 
please  her  husband  and  placate  his  mother,  but  art  re- 
claimed her  child,  and  in  1848,  while  French  bombs 
threatened  Eome,  she  gave  three  representations  to  help 
Piscenti,  one  of  her  former  managers,  who  had  been 
imprisoned  for  debt.  I  have  forgotten  what  play  she 
appeared  in,  but  I  think  it  was  in  Cuores  ad  Aeti,  by 
Forti.  At  any  rate,  her  father-in-law  went  to  see  her, 
was  completely  swamped  by  her  greatness,  forgot  his 
prejudices  in  his  enthusiasm,  and,  in  fact,  took  her  to  his 
heart  as  the  Marchesa  del  Grillo,  but  allowed  her  to 
become  once  more  and  forever  "  Adelaide  Eistori "  to 
the  public. 

Then  she  began  her  faithful  study  of  high  tragedy. 
She  made  her  debut  in  Alfieri's  masterpiece  of  Myrrha, 
and  unluckily  failed ;  but  she  afterwards  surpassed  all 
other  actresses  in  this  part.  She  became  triumphant 
through  all  Italy,  and  sighed  for  Paris,  which  is  now,  as 
in  antiquity,  alone  entitled  to  throw  the  apple.  It  is 
the  world's  tribunal  for  art.  In  1852  Eachel  had  vis- 
ited Italy ;  why  should  not  Eistori  visit  Paris  1  The 
actress  was  determined,  and  in  1855  she  was  playing 
Francesca  da  Eimini  to  a  pit  full  of  kings,  with  Rossi  as 
Paolo,  and  in  Paris !     What  a  triumph ! 

Dumas  2>^re  was  her  first  conquest.  Scribe  paid 
court  to  the  new  favorite,  and  Jules  Janin,  the  clever 
Figaro  of  the  Journal  des  Dehats^  sealed  her  fate  by  his 
clever  praises.  Myrrha  followed,  la  suhlime  actrice  had 
a  furious  success,  and  her  triumph  was  celebrated  in 
verse,  marble,  prose,  and  music. 

She  was  most  astonished  herself.  "  Why,"  said  she, 
"  I  played  Myrrha  to  empty  benches  at  Turin,  at  eighty 


ADELAIDE    RISTORI  118 

centimes  a  ticket,  while  here  in  Paris  they  will  pay  ten 
francs  and  crowd  the  theatre  to  see  me.    Why  is  that  ?" 

Rachel  resigned  her  position  as  a  societaire  of  the 
Theatre  Fran^ais,  and  the  throne  was  offered  to  Eistori 
by  the  director,  Arsene  Houssaye.  The  Emperor  sent 
M.  Fould  as  his  advocate,  begging  her  to  accept. 

But  the  Italian  tragedienne  was  true  to  her  flag;  she 
w^ould  not  desert  the  Italian  language  and  drama.  She 
won,  and  received  the  imperial  decree,  authorizing  her 
to  play  at  the  Theatre  Italien  for  four  months.  Her 
first  season  brought  her  a  half -million  of  francs. 

To  see  this  illustrious  woman  first  play  Marie  Antoi- 
nette and  Maria  Stuarda,  and  then  to  hear  her  tell  these 
facts  with  flashing  eye  was  a  most  dramatic  experience. 

The  Emperor  sent  her  a  beautiful  bracelet  in  form  of 
a  serpent,  the  head  sparkling  with  diamonds,  which  she 
was  fond  of  wearing.  Medals  were  struck  in  her  honor, 
and  all  the  world  acknowledged  her  greatness  as  a 
tragedienne.  The  King  of  Prussia  decorated  her  with 
the  Order  of  Merit  for  her  Deborah. 

She  had  been  emphatically  a  queen's  favorite  in  Spain, 
and  always  spoke  well  of  poor  Isabella.  She  saved  the 
life  of  a  Spanish  soldier,  Nicolas  Chapado,  by  her  elo- 
quence, kneeling  first  to  Narvaez,  then  to  the  queen — 
a  story  she  was  fond  of  telling. 

She  played,  in  French,  Beatrix  at  the  Odeon ;  it  proved 
a  great  success.  Then  she  took  Shakespeare  to  Lon- 
don! She  played  Lady  Macbeth  and  Elizabeth,  and 
was  called  the  second  Siddons.  In  1864,  she  sailed 
for  Egypt  and  played  in  Cairo,  Athens,  Constantino- 
ple, giving  the  tragedies  of  Alfieri  beneath  the  shadow 
of  the  Pyramids. 

She  came  to  America  with  all  this  glory  behind  her, 
and  was  received,  both  as  an  actress  and  as  a  woman,  with 


114  AN   EPISTLE   TO   POSTEKITY 

most  enthusiastic  welcome.  She  was  an  intelligent,  in- 
dustrious, earnest,  good  woman,  with  great  sensibility 
and  most  wonderful  talents ;  but  as  a  successor  to  Kachel 
she  never  seemed  to  me  a  genius.  She  rose  early ;  she 
attended  and  managed  every  rehearsal ;  she  had  a  most 
excellent  company ;  she  was  the  strongest  and  most  in- 
defatigable person  ever  heard  of.  She  used  her  needle 
cleverly,  took  care  of  her  theatrical  wardrobe ;  she  was 
reading,  writing  letters,  attending  to  her  daughter  (a 
beautiful  girl),  making  calls,  going  to  dinners  and  balls ; 
yet  all  her  excitements  were  so  reduced  to  a  system 
that  she  never  seemed  fatigued.  The  only  woman  whom 
I  have  met  who  seemed  at  all  like  her  is  Mrs.  Potter 
Palmer,  of  Chicago,  and  she  is  very  like  her.  The  prac- 
tical was  not  swallowed  up  in  the  ideal  in  this  extraor- 
dinary woman,  whom  I  am  happy  to  have  known.  She 
never  broke  an  engagement ;  she  was  always  punctual ; 
her  people  adored  her. 

Of  her  parts  I  liked  best  her  Marie  Antoinette.  It 
was  infinitely  affecting,  tender,  and  true.  Her  beauty 
in  it  was  something  astonishing.  She  must  have  been 
fifty  years  of  age ;  she  did  not  look  thirty.  And  the 
support  was  admirable.  The  king  was  played  by  an 
actor  so  good  that  he  is  always  before  me  when  I  read 
of  Louis  XYI.  She  told  me  that  she  always  cried  an 
hour  or  two  after  playing  this  part,  which  shows  that 
she  was  an  actress  at  heart ;  but  she  declared  that  hard 
work  had  done  more  for  her  than  inspiration.  She  was 
grateful  to  her  father,  her  grandmother,  and  her  early 
teachers  because  they  were  so  severe.  She  never  spoke 
of  Madalena  Pomatelli  except  as  "a  great  beauty." 
This  was  her  mother ;  I  suppose  a  very  mediocre  ac- 
tress. But  she  must  have  been  a  good  woman  to  have 
had  so  serious  and  so  good  a  daughter.    Eistori  had  the 


ADELAIDE    RISTORI  115 

temperament  of  virtue.  She  was  naturally  religious, 
firm,  temperate,  and  judicious ;  and  if  not  a  genius,  she 
certainly  had  incomparable  talent.  Her  dresses  were 
studies  from  all  that  history  and  art  could  do  for  the 
drama;  she  redeemed  the  honor  of  the  Italian  stage, 
and  opened  the  door  for  Salvini,  the  greatest  Othello 
and  Hamlet  and  Samson  that  the  world  has  seen. 

She  made  a  very  large  fortune  and  left  her  children 
rich.  "What  a  fortune  to  inherit  the  memory  of  such  a 
mother !  A  woman  who  could  not  be  moved  from  her 
sublime  pedestal  of  devotion  to  art,  to  duty,  to  religion ; 
who  could  pass  through  all  the  temptations  of  youth, 
beauty,  celebrity,  and  triumph  utterly  unscathed !  She 
was  nobly  patriotic,  true  to  her  friend  Cavour,  kind- 
hearted  and  philanthropic  to  a  degree.  It  is  hard  to 
say  which  to  admire  the  most :  the  talent  of  the  actress, 
making  famous  the  woman,  or  the  character  of  the 
Avoman,  giving  depth,  solidity,  and  enduring  strength 
to  the  fame  of  the  actress. 

I  cannot  leave  this  celebrated  memory  without  refer- 
ring to  her  Queen  Elizabeth.  The  play  gave  us  forty 
years  of  that  stormy  life.  Eistori,  coming  on  as  a  young 
girl,  the  pretty  auburn  -  haired  princess,  adroitly  grew 
ten  years  older  at  every  decade  by  putting  on  more 
clothes,  more  jewels,  and  more  paint  and  whitewash, 
until  the  lion  woman,  sinking  down  to  die  on  the  stage, 
Avas  the  old  Elizabeth  who  shook  the  dying  countess  for 
having  deceived  her  about  Leicester's  ring.  It  was  a 
superb  study.  I  cannot  forget  her  startling  scream  as 
she  heard  of  the  success  of  Francis  Drake  and  the  de- 
struction of  the  Spanish  Armada.  "Drak!"  said  she, 
throwing  out  a  long  forefinger,  as  if  she  would  touch 
the  absent  commander  and  give  him  the  accolade.  It 
seemed  that  "Drak"  could  hear  that  cry;  it  had  in  it 


116  AN   EPISTLE   TO   POSTERITY 

all  the  uncontrollable  emotion  of  the  red-haired  daugh- 
ter of  Henry  YIII. 

It  is  a  curious  fact  that  the  two  greatest  actresses 
who  came  to  the  United  States  played  in  French  and 
in  Italian  to  audiences  not  half  of  whom  understood 
either  language.  But  the  genius  of  artistic  and  dra- 
matic representation  confounded  the  Tower  of  Babel. 
Kachel,  Eistori,  Sara  Bernhardt,  and  Duse  would  be 
understood  in  the  Choctaw.  For  them,  and  such  as 
they,  the  Tower  of  Babel  does  not  exist. 


CHAPTER  VII 

A  Glimpse  at  Literary  Boston— Prescott,  Emerson,  and  Agassiz— 
Darley's  Picture  of  Wasliington  Irving  and  His  Friends — The 
Knickerhocker  Magazine— hlv?,.  Botta's  Salon — Reminiscences  of 
Bancroft  and  Bryant — A  Birthday  at  the  Century  Club — Long- 
fellow. 

Although  we  did  not  leave  home  as  much  in  those 
days  as  residents  of  l^ew  York  do  now — we  had  no- 
where to  go,  unless  we  made  a  long,  wearisome  journey 
to  Florida  for  a  cough — we  still  found  time  for  visits 
to  Washington  and  to  Boston. 

I,  being  a  New  England  woman,  was  true  to  my  Bos- 
ton, and  went  to  Nahant  in  summer  as  well  as  to  Cam- 
bridge in  winter.  There  I  saw  Prescott  and  Agassiz, 
and  Lowell  and  Longfellow,  and,  much  later  on,  the 
youthful  Howells,  just  beginning  his  successful  career ; 
and  Mr.  and  Mrs.  James  T.  Fields,  and  Dr.  Holmes,  and 
Mrs.  Julia  Ward  Howe,  most  witty  of  women.  It  was 
"  the  Illuminati ";  it  was  most  delightful,  and  Mr.  Pres- 
cott was  one  of  its  distinguished  members. 

Mr.  Prescott  was  a  true  son  of  Boston ;  well-born, 
well-bred,  of  extremely  dignified  and  agreeable  man- 
ners, and  witli  a  delicate  and  nobly  chiselled  face.  He 
was  a  perfect  man  of  the  world,  fond  of  society,  and 
with  not  the  shghtest  touch  of  the  pedant  about  him.  I 
saw  him  frequently  and  intimately  at  his  Nahant  house 
and  at  the  neighboring  villa  of  his  daughter,  Mrs.  Law- 
rence, who  was  an  admirable  hostess  as  well  as  a  beau- 
tiful woman.     Although  he  was  past  sixty  when  I  first 


118  AN   EPISTLE    TO   POSTEKITY 

met  him,  he  was  still  as  attractive  as  a  man  of  thirty 
in  dress  and  manner,  and  with  the  added  dehght  of  his 
extremely  cultivated  mind.  His  infirmity  of  sight  did 
not  prevent  his  getting  about  alone  and  eating  his  din- 
ner with  the  grace  of  a  diplomatist.  If  he  asked  any 
one  for  the  toast  or  the  cream  at  one  of  his  daughter's 
delicious  country  teas,  it  was  really  a  pleasantry  and  a 
compliment,  and  he  could  make  his  infirmity  of  sight  a 
joke.  If  the  cream-pitcher  turned  up  under  his  hand, 
he  would  thank  the  finder  and  say,  "  If  it  had  been  a 
bear  it  would  have  bit  me."  He  asked  my  husband  and 
myself  to  his  "  workshop,"  as  he  called  his  library,  and 
showed  us  the  apparatus  which  is  used  by  the  blind — a 
Avire-ruled  machine  for  guiding  the  hand. 

His  library  was  filled  with  Spanish  books,  and  with 
documents  (acquired  at  great  expense)  from  the  archives 
of  Spain ;  these  were  lying  all  about,  arranged  in  that 
order  which  is  Heaven's  first  law.  He  told  us  that  his 
sight  would  come  back  curiously  at  times.  He  took  im- 
mense care  of  his  health,  and  walked  every  day  around 
a  great  tree  until  he  had  worn  a  path.  Mr.  Prescott's 
liome  relations  were  delightful.  He  had  married  the 
love  of  his  youth,  a  beautiful  Miss  Amory.  He  told  me 
he  used  to  look  through  a  window  where  he  could  see  her 
dance.  Surrounded  by  his  family,  and  with  his  charm- 
ing daughter  next  door,  this  distinguished  man  passed 
his  summer  at  Lynn,  working  every  day  for  several 
hours,  and  then  emerging  from  his  library,  wnth  none  of 
the  dust  of  the  old  folios  adhering,  bringing  with  him 
only  the  aroma  of  learning.  When  I  travelled  in  Spain 
some  years  since  I  used  as  my  guide-book  Ferdinand 
and  Isabella^  his  masterpiece;  nor  do  I  want  a  more 
delightful  set  of  books  with  which  to  cheat  Time  of  his 
dulness  than  his  entertaining:  histories.     I  have  an  auto- 


PEESCOTT   AND   EMERSON  119 

graph  of  his,  "  written  through  the  bars,"  as  he  called 
his  wire  net  : 

"I  am  happy  to  welcome  my  dear  Mrs.  Sherwood  in  my  little 
study,  and  wish  she  would  always  come  and  never  go. 

"W.  H.  Prescott." 

This  is  more  precious  than  rubies,  as  testifying  to  the 
amiable  character  of  this  most  amiable  of  men.  He  had 
enjoyed  a  great  triumph  in  England  on  his  first  visit 
there,  and  told  us  much  about  it/  He  said  Sydney  Smith 
had  sent  him  word  before  he  went,  saying,  "  Send  Pres- 
cott  over  here  and  we'll  drown  him  in  turtle-soup." 

''  I  sent  him  back  word,"  said  this  genial-tempered 
man,  "  that  I  could  swim  in  those  seas."  And  indeed 
he  could.  As  an  elegant  American  he  was  a  good 
specimen  to  send  to  London,  as  indeed  were  Everett 
and  Motley,  who  seemed  fitted  to  rub  out  the  carica- 
tures of  Uncle  Sam  with  which  Punch  and  other  pa- 
pers have  amused  themselves. 

Mr.  Prescott  was  most  fortunate  in  his  biographer, 
for  George  Ticknor  was  one  of  the  ripest  of  scholars 
and  Prescott's  friend  of  a  lifetime.  These  men  were  as 
far  off  as  possible  from  the  Concord  School  and  the 
transcendentalists,  who  were  making  themselves  world- 
famous  at  the  same  time.  Tom  Appleton's  witty  expla- 
nation that  "  the  reason  there  were  so  many  Unitarians 
in  Boston  was  because  a  man  born  in  Boston  did  not 
think  that  he  needed  to  be  born  again"  did  not  apply 
to  Mr.  Prescott  or  to  Mr.  Ticknor. 

I  dare  say  they  looked  upon  Theodore  Parker  with 
horror,  as  he  was  a  "come-outer"  even  among  the 
Unitarians. 

Emerson  was  "the  consummate  flower  which  the 
sturdy  root  and  thorny  stem  of  Puritanism  existed  to 


120  AN   EPISTLE   TO    POSTERITY 

produce."  He  was  a  poet,  a  genius,  and  had  the  face  of 
an  angel.  He  had  gone  early  to  England,  and  knew 
Carlyle,  Wordsworth,  Landor,  Coleridge,  and  that  fine 
group  of  literary  men.  He  grew  too  liberal  for  the 
Unitarians,  and  left  the  parish  over  which  he  was  set- 
tled to  become  a  lecturer  and  literary  man.  He  seems 
to  have  been  the  first  man  in  America  to  recognize 
Carlyle,  and  he  spoke  of  "  Craigenputtock,"  with  its 
desolate,  feathery  hills,  as  "  the  spot  where  the  lonely 
scholar  nourished  his  mighty  heart."  He  became  the 
Sage  of  Concord ;  around  him  were  Thoreau,  Curtis, 
Hawthorne,  Ripley,  W.  H.  Channing,  Parker,  PhiUips, 
Lowell,  and  Oliver  Wendell  Holmes.  The  little  agri- 
cultural village  began  to  put  forth  germs  and  growths. 
The  author  of  the  Rumhle  Bee  gave  it  a  tropical  climate. 
The  prophet  was  most  honored  in  his  own  country,  and 
pilgrimages  were  made  to  this  modern  Mecca. 

I  had  heard  this  great  thinker  lecture,  but  had  never 
known  him  personally  until  about  1858,  when  I  met 
him  at  a  party  at  Mr.  Bancroft's.  To  my  amazement, 
he  showed  a  curiosity  to  know  "  who  people  were." 

James  Russell  Lowell,  who  had  the  discernment  to 
read  Emerson's  character,  regarded  his  head  as  a  well- 
balanced  sphere.  "One  pole  on  Olympus  and  t'other 
on  'change "  is  his  witty  line  describing  this  prince  of 
dreamers,  this  "  simple  child  and  worldly  wise,  who  so 
largely  raised  the  value  of  real  estate  in  Concord."  I  re- 
member asking  Mr.  Emerson  if  Hawthorne  (whom,  with 
other  young  novel- readers,  I  was  then  adoring)  ever 
Avent  into  society.  "  Oh  no,"  said  Emerson.  "  It  would 
take  a  forty -dowager  power  to  drag  him  to  such  a  party 
as  this." 

His  great  friend,  the  devout  idealist  Alcott,  I  never 
saw,  although   I  read  many   of   his    Orphic  Sayings. 


EMERSON   AND   AGASSIZ  121 

Mr.  Emerson  brought  nothing  of  this  Concord  atmos- 
phere into  society,  but  a  great  deal  of  good  Yankee 
curiosity.  When  I  asked  for  a  Massachusetts  lady 
whom  he  knew  he  looked  at  me  with  those  penetrating 
eyes  that  seemed  too  far  off  to  have  recognized  any- 
thing lower  than  the  rings  of  Saturn. 

"Well,  marm,  how  did  you  happen  to  have  known 
her?"  said  he.  I  had  to  give  him  my  whole  lineage  be- 
fore he  was  satisfied.  I  remember  that  he  quoted  Al- 
cott.  We  were  speaking  of  a  certain  President,  whom 
we  did  not  love,  and  his  large  majority. 

"  Oh !"  said  he,  "  Beelzebub  marshals  majorities,  and 
multitudes  ever  lie."     A  famous  Orjyhic  utterance. 

Mr.  Emerson  was  very  learned.  He  could  have  been 
the  "instructor  of  academies."  Agassiz  preferred  his 
conversation  on  natural  science  to  that  of  any  other 
man  in  America,  and  the  young  poets  went  to  him  to 
hear  about  Beaumont  and  Fletcher,  Plato  and  Boehme, 
Bhagavad  Gita,  Hafiz  and  Goethe ;  he  could  talk  of  them 
all.  He  said  on  one  occasion,  "  When  nature  wants  an 
artist  she  makes  Tennyson  or  Eobert  Browning."  And 
again,  ^^ Paracelsus  is  the  wail  of  the  nineteenth  century." 

When  I  saw  Emerson  again  the  mighty  intellect  was 
in  ruins.  The  memory  so  deeply  stored  was  wiped  out. 
The  inductive  philosopher  was  no  more;  but  "that 
mystic  past,  that  miracle  sense,"  which  had  been  pres- 
ent in  his  essays  and  poems  will  last  forever.  He  is  to 
many  people  the  seer  and  the  prophet  still. 

After  seeing  Ralph  Waldo  Emerson  I  spent  one  glori- 
ous day  at  Nahant  with  Agassiz.  He  took  us  to  his  lab- 
oratory, where  we  saw  jelly-fishes  galore  and  heard  his 
wise,  witty  talk,  which  instructed  the  American  people — 
North,  South,  East,  and  West.  If  ever  a  man  made  nat- 
ure give  up  her  secrets,  that  man  was  Agassiz.    He  was 


123  AN   EPISTLE   TO   POSTERITY 

large,  hearty,  and  most  agreeable.  His  sympathy 
amounted  to  enthusiasm.  He  had  polite  French  man- 
ners, and  left  you  with  the  impression  that  you  had 
contributed  very  largely  to  his  stock  of  information.  I 
have  known  several  great  men  who  had  this  kind  of 
flattery.  One  was  Judge  Story  and  another  was  Gen- 
eral Dix.  You  always  felt  rather  an  awe  of  yourself 
after  these  supremely  celebrated  men  had  humbled 
themselves  before  you.  It  is  a  characteristic  of  a  great 
heart  and  a  supreme  tact. 

Agassiz  spent  happy  days  at  Cambridge  and  at  Na- 
hant.  The  nation  was  listening  with  hand  behind  her 
ear,  and  Nature  threw  her  sea-urchins  and  starfish  and 
every  fish  suspected  of  any  eccentricity  at  his  feet.  He 
gave  lectures  all  over  the  country,  and  told  me  that  he 
could  invoke  sleep  when  he  needed  it,  even  to  sleeping 
when  standing  up.  His  health  seemed  to  be  perfect. 
He  gave  one  the  idea  of  an  immense  and  very  agree- 
able boy  who  somehow  had  come  to  know  everything, 
not  by  the  usual  hard  penance  of  learning  it  at  a  school, 
but  by  intuition.  He  told  me  that  he  had  once  brought 
a  bunch  of  wild  flowers  to  his  mother  instead  of  his 
appointed  task,  and  asked  her  to  tell  him  all  about  them. 
As  she  could  not  do  so,  he  said,  "  One  day,  dear  mamma, 
I  will  tell  you  all  about  them."  How  nobly  he  kept  his 
promise !  Agassiz  did  not  believe  in  the  Darwinian  the- 
ory, which  was  a  great  comfort  to  me. 

But  to  return  to  New  York  for  a  moment.  Imagine 
the  delight  of  Darley,  the  artist,  when  called  upon  to 
paint  "Washington  Irving  and  his  Friends":  Prescbtt, 
with  his  handsome  face ;  Longfellow,  thoughtfully  at- 
tentive ;  Fenimore  Cooper,  conscious  of  his  own  world- 
wide fame,  yet  cordially  mindful  of  the  higher  emi- 
nence of  Irving;  behind  Irving  the  happy,  smiling  face 


123 

of  Ralph  Waldo  Emerson,  hopeful  of  all  good  things ; 
and  again  the  strong,  decisive  profile  of  Bancroft  in  the 
attitude  of  an  attentive  listener.  This  picture  of  repre- 
sentative writers  in  America,  in  history,  philosophy,  ro- 
mance, and  poetry,  was  also  enriched  by  Bryant's  noble 
head,  Hawthorne's  dreamy  face,  H.  T.  Tuckerman's 
scholarly  look,  and  Willis,  the  Count  d'Orsay  of  the  lit- 
erary college,  jotting  down  his  impressions. 

This  picture  was  drawn,  I  think,  for  the  Knicherbocker 
Magazine.  I  would  give  a  great  deal  for  a  copy  of  it, 
for  I  have  lost  the  impression  which  I  owed  to  the  kind- 
ness of  Lewis  Gajdord  Clark,  then  editor  of  the  Knick- 
erbocker Magazine^  to  whom  I  had  taken  a  story  called 
The  Man  in  Armor — a  story  which  grew  out  of  my  West 
Indian  experience.  I  have  the  poor  little  dusty  thing 
beside  me  now  ;  but  this  accidental  connection  with  that 
magazine  led  to  the  delightful  privilege  of  knowing 
many  of  the  writers,  and  to  my  admittance  to  the  liter- 
ary circle  of  Miss  Anna  C.  Lynch,  an  American  Eahel,* 
our  first  authoress  to  hold  a  salon,  my  friend  for  the 
rest  of  her  life.  It  was  a  most  agreeable  circle.  If 
there  is  anything  so  good  now  in  New  York  I  do  not 
know  it.  Mrs.  Botta,  after  her  marriage — for  Miss  Lynch 
married  the  Italian  physicist  Botta  early  in  the  fifties — 
continued  to  be  the  Rahel,  as  I  have  said,  of  New  York 
until  her  death.  At  her  literary  reunions  I  have  met 
not  only  many  of  these  most  agreeable  literary  men  and 
women  of  our  own  country,  but  the  historians,  authors, 
and  artists  of  England,  France,  and  Italy.  Such  a  grand 
phalanx  as  would  often  gather  in  a  single  evening! — 
Christine  Nilsson,  Salvini,  Ristori,  Anthony  Trollope, 


*  Rahel  was  the  wife  of  Varnhagen  von  Euse,  and  the  Queen  of 
the  German  salon. 


134  AN   EPISTLE   TO    POSTERITY 

Sala,  Thackeray,  and  George  P.  Marsh ;  Mr.  W.  ^Y. 
Story,  home  from  Kome,  and  General  di  Cesnola,  fresh 
from  Cyprus.  This  was  a  salon  indeed!  Everything 
that  was  fresh  and  new.  Paul  du  Chaillu,  from  Africa 
and  the  land  of  the  gorilla,  and  Charles  Kingsley,  with 
his  gifted  daughter  Kose.  From  time  to  time  a  fresh 
arrival — I^.  P.  Willis,  General  Morris,  or  Lewis  Gay  lord 
Clark — while  in  one  corner  would  sit  the  authoress  of 
Queechy  and  the  poetesses  Alice  and  Phoebe  Cary,  and 
Bryant,  Bancroft,  Everett,  and  Emerson.  Then  to  know 
Mr.  Bancroft  and  to  have  had  the  entree  to  his  always 
hospitable  house  was  like  going  behind  the  scenes  with 
the  stage-manager  after  having  been  taken  to  the  play. 
He  knew  everything  and  everybody;  had  a  most  ex- 
haustive habit  of  reading,  and  sometimes  asked  me  to 
come  and  hear  the  last  chapter  of  his  History  as  he  read 
the  MS.  to  his  wife  and  a  few  friends.  He  sent  me  books 
such  as  then  only  seemed  to  come  to  a  great  scholar.  At 
Newport  his  knowledge  would  overflow  in  the  most  de- 
lightful manner,  as,  in  talking  of  the  old  mill,  he  would 
tell  us  how  he  had  waded  through  a  swamp  near  Taunton 
River  to  read  a  runic  inscription  supposed  to  have  been 
left  by  the  Danes,  which  he  thought  would  throw  light 
on  it.  He  waded  his  way  through  w^ater,  forced  his 
way  through  scrub,  and  was  often  impeded  by  a  lack  of 
foothold,  but  still  never  lost  his  grip  on  the  subject ;  and 
be  was  honest  enough  to  say  that  he  had  gained  no  light 
on  the  subject  of  the  origin  of  the  old  mill.  He  con- 
cluded that  it  is  simply  a  windmill,  built  by  an  early 
settler  of  Newport. 

Mr.  Bancroft,  unlike  Yarnhagen  von  Ense,  whom  he 
was  fond  of  quoting,  never  lost  his  pleasure  in  society. 
He  said  that  every  ten  years  a  man  should  move  nearer 
the  sun.     He  moved  from  Boston  to  New  York,  from 


EEMINISCENCES   OF   BANCROFT  125 

New  York  to  Washington ;  was  Secretary  of  the  Navy ; 
afterwards  American  Minister  to  England.  His  party 
having  gone  out  of  power,  he  retreated  to  his  books 
for  the  day,  but  spent  his  evenings  in  society.  The 
energetic  historian's  lamp  was  lighted  at  five  on  winter 
mornings,  and  when  called  to  breakfast  he  had  already 
done  a  noble  day's  work.  Later  on  Mr.  Bancroft  became 
our  Minister  to  Germany,  and  was  complimented  by 
Bismarck  on  his  perfect  German. 

He  seemed  never  to  forget  anything,  nor  to  need  any 
other  amusement  than  that  which  he  could  always  pro- 
vide for  himself.  He  rode  horseback  daily,  and  never, 
until  he  was  eighty,  had  he  even  been  troubled  with  a 
headache.  This  was  one  evening  at  Washington,  when 
I  heard  him  complain  of  a  dizziness  in  the  head.  He 
was  a  very  peculiar  man,  and  had  some  stiff  mannerisms. 
His  career  had  been  not  unlike  that  of  Everett.  He 
went  to  Gottingen  as  a  young  man  from  his  father's  par- 
sonage. He  acquired  his  tendency  for  historical  research 
from  Heeren,  Eichhorn,  and  Schlosser.  For  several  years 
he  was  at  the  head  of  the  Eound  Hill  Academy  for  boys 
at  Northampton,  where  he  had  for  one  of  his  pupils  the 
witty  Tom  Appleton,  and  for  his  undermaster  Dr.  Cogs- 
well, afterwards  the  learned  first  curator  of  the  Astor 
Library.  He  must  have  been  a  severe  master,  for  "  Un- 
cle Tom  Appleton"  used  to  tell  stories  of  his  school 
days  and  say,  "  Mr.  Cogswell,  whom  I  loved,  and  Mr. 
Bancroft,  whom  I  didn't."  But  Mr.  Bancroft  grew  ex- 
ceedingly amiable  in  his  old  age,  as  men  seldom  do. 
He  was  always  most  charming  to  me  and  kind  to 
every  one. 

It  was  an  epoch  in  my  life  when  I  first  heard  Charles 
Sumner.  This  most  honored  man  of  Boston  was  deliv- 
ering his  bold  and  fiery  invectives  against  slaver}'-  in  the 


126  AN   EPISTLE   TO   POSTERITY 

early  fifties,  and  came  nearer  to  Webster  as  an  orator 
than  any  one  I  remember.  He  was  fine-looking,  and  had 
an  English  manner.  I  came  very  near  being  in  the  Sen- 
ate when  he  was  felled  by  Preston  Brooks,  which  as- 
sault laid  him  on  a  bed  of  sickness  for  months,  and  from 
which  he  did  not  recover  for  years.  This  undeserved 
misfortune  evoked  for  him  a  cosmopolitan  sympathy. 
The  last  time  I  remember  seeing  him  was  at  a  dinner 
of  Governor  Morgan's,  given  to  General  Grant  after  he 
was  elected  but  before  he  was  inaugurated.  Roscoe 
Conkling  was  at  that  dinner,  and  I  remember  thinking 
how  much  Conkling  resembled  Coriolanus  in  Shake- 
speare's immortal  sketch  of  that  passionate  hero,  and 
again  as  he  appears  in  Beethoven's  Coriolan^  where  the 
music  makes  you  think  of  the  stamp  of  an  armed  heel. 
Conkling  was  impressive. 

The  American  is  said  to  become  full-flavored,  and  in 
time  a  most  all-round  man,  through  the  polish  which 
Europe  can  impart.  Mr.  Sumner  had  behind  him  all 
that  Boston  and  Cambridge  could  give  before  he  went 
to  Europe.  He  had  a  great  brain  and  a  great  soul,  but 
he  had  no  sense  of  humor.  It  may  be  because  of  this 
limitation  that  he  was  never  a  popular  man.  But  he 
rescued  us  from  a  helpless  state  of  degradation  at  a 
trying  hour.  His  services  should  never  be  forgotten, 
particularly  the  noble  speech  delivered  in  1869,  which 
fitly  rounded  his  great  career. 

Another  genius  whom  I  met  at  Mrs.  Botta's  was  Fitz- 
James  O'Brien,  the  young  Irish  poet,  author  of  A  Dia- 
mond Lens^  which,  next  to  the  stories  of  Bret  Harte 
(which  came  ten  years  later),  was  the  most  surprising 
short  story  that  ever  startled  the  reading  American 
pubhc.  Eitz-James  O'Brien  followed  up  his  successes 
by  delightful  poems,  and  his  Monody  on  the  Death  of 


MRS.  BOTTA's   LITEEARY    QUALITIES  127 

Kane  was  and  is  worthily  remembered.  He  was  a  fas- 
cinating conversationalist,  a  rather  handsome,  dashing, 
well-dressed  young  Irish  gentleman,  very  much  courted 
in  society  for  a  brief  hour.  He  went  to  the  war,  fought 
bravely,  and  surrendered  his  young  life  gracefully  and 
well  after  the  second  battle  of  Bull  Eun. 

It  is  a  thousand  pities  that  Mrs.  Botta  had  not  had 
the  French  autobiographical  spirit,  for  she  could  have 
given  us  immortal  sketches  of  the  historical  characters 
who  for  forty  years  went  in  and, out  of  her  hospitable 
door.  She  had  sentimentalists  and  genuine  thinkers 
among  her  guests.  She  could  have  given  an  unpar- 
alleled chronicle  of  that  early  dawn  which  led  up  to 
Harjper^s  Magazine,  the  Atlantic  Monthly,  and  the  thou- 
sand and  one  successors  of  those  famous  monthlies. 
She  herself  had  been  glad  to  write  for  the  Demoeratio 
Magazine  at  ten  dollars  a  page  in  her  youth ;  and  al- 
though she  never  cared  much  for  society,  she  could 
have  given  a  tolerably  faithful  chronicle  of  society  from 
1850  to  1880,  before  that  respectable  and  conservative 
epoch  had  harnessed  four  horses  to  its  carriage. 

She  wrote  well  herself,  both  prose  and  poetry,  and 
with  great  industry  compiled  a  book  of  the  History  of 
Literature. 

But  how  much  greater  would  her  fame  be  now  if  she 
had  had  a  Boswell  or  a  Samuel  Pepys  in  her  disposition : 
we  love  the  minor  details.  One  would  meet  all  the 
most  distinguished  men  and  women  at  Mrs.  Botta's,  per- 
haps four  times  during  the  winter,  at  some  reception 
given  to  one  great  man  or  woman,  the  author  of  the  last 
novel  or  poem.  I  remember  T.  Buchanan  Eead  reciting 
his  Sheridan^s  Ride  at  one  of  these,  and  I  remember 
a  charming  breakfast  with  Booth,  with  Kistori,  and  with 
Salvini  there.     I  also  remember  delightful  interviews 


128  AN   EPISTLE    TO   POSTERITY 

with  Charles  Kingsley,  as  he  was  twice  her  guest.  She 
"  kept  house  "  admirably,  and  her  little  breakfasts  and 
dinners  were  perfect. 

She  compiled  during  the  war  a  very  valuable  book  of 
autographs  and  prints,  which  was  sold  for  the  benefit 
of  the  Sanitary  Commission — or,  at  least,  she  intended 
that  it  should  be,  but  the  sudden  peace  at  Appomattox 
Court  House  and  the  overflow  of  money  for  the  San- 
itary Commission  came  before  she  had  finished  it,  and 
she  gave  the  money  to  France  to  establish  an  art  schol- 
arship. 

As  a  woman  she  was  a  model  character,  ready  to  drop 
her  own  personality  entirely,  unselfish,  agreeable,  patient, 
sweet — the  very  person  to  hold  a  salon ;  with  liberal 
opinions,  but  of  a  most  respectable  and  modest  character. 
She  was  an  evangelical  moralist  in  conduct,  but  would 
go  to  hear  everybody  preach — from  archbishops  of  the 
Roman  Church  to  Henry  Ward  Beech er.  She  was  an 
*'  intelligent  social  being,"  but  I  do  not  think  she  ever 
asked  herself  what  she  did  believe.  She  was  determined 
to  see  and  allow  for  both  sides  of  the  shield.  She  was 
interested  in  all  the  ultra  views  of  the  principal  thinkers 
of  her  epoch.  She  liked  to  bring  them  all  together. 
Everything  that  belonged  to  goodness,  virtue,  and  hu- 
manity was  dear  to  her.  Everything  she  could  do  to 
advance  the  interests  of  art  and  literature,  everything 
to  help  a  friend  in  distress,  to  make  the  world  happy 
and  better,  to  promote  sociability  and  the  recognition  of 
talent,  this  dear  and  distinguished  woman  did,  during  a 
long  life.  A  thousand  pities  that  she  did  not  write  her- 
self down  every  day  of  her  life ! 

There  one  would  meet  her  early  friend  Mr.  Charles 
Butler,  the  Hon.  John  Bigelow,  Minister  to  France  and 
biographer  of  Franklin,  who  had  helped  her  to  rise; 


A  BIRTHDAY   CELEBRATION  139 

there  would  come  Charlotte  Cushman  and  her  faithful 
Emma  Stebbins,  the  sculptor,  and  Harriet  Hosmer,  who 
gave  us  the  "  Puck  "  and  many  another  lovely  marfile. 
It  was  a  salon  after  the  French  fashion. 

Before  I  leave  the  literati,  let  me  record  a  most  event- 
ful day — an  evening  in  1864 — the  celebration  of  the 
birthday  of  Mr.  Bryant  at  the  Century  Club.  He  was 
seventy — a  fine-looking,  Homeric  sage  with  a  big  white 
beard,  a  most  venerable-looking  personage,  with  brilliant 
eyes  and  a  manner  which,  when  he  chose,  could  be  smil- 
ing and  agreeable,  and  which,  w'hen  he  did  not  choose, 
could  be  grave  and  repellent.  The  Century  Club  loved 
him  to  a  man,  and  their  elegant  rooms  in  Fifteenth  Street 
were  Avreathed  with  violets,  immortelles,  evergreens,  and 
roses  on  that  evening.  Mr.  Bryant  and  Mr.  Bancroft 
entered  together,  and  sat  on  a  dais  surrounded  by  such 
lights  as  Emerson,  Holmes,  Willis,  Street,  Tuckerman, 
Boker,  Eead,  Stoddard,  and  Ba3"ard  Taylor.  At  the 
conclusion  of  some  well-chosen  music  Mr.  Bancroft  ad- 
dressed Mr.  Bryant,  and  congratulated  him  and  the  world 
that  the  poet's  eye  was  undimmed,  his  step  as  elastic  as 
it  was  in  his  youth,  his  mind  as  strong,  and  his  brain  as 
prolific.  Mr.  Bryant  answered  in  a  very  witty  disser- 
tation upon  the  folly  of  felicitating  any  one  on  being 
*'  seventy  years  old."  He  referred  "  to  the  beauty  of 
youth,  its  quick  senses,  its  perfect  and  pearly  teeth,  its 
flowing  hair."  He  drew  a  graphic  picture  of  what  the 
world  would  be  if  it  were  made  up  of  old  men,  and  ex- 
pressed his  thankfulness  that  there  were  youths  and 
maidens  to  laugh  and  be  merry. 

Yet  those  two  wonderful  old  men  were  destined  to 
live  one  of  them  to  eighty -four,  and  the  other  to  nearly 
ninet}^,  while  many  a  youth  and  maid  who  listened  had 
gone  to  an  early  grave. 


130  AN   EPISTLE   TO   POSTEKITY 

Mr.  Bryant  spoke  of  Pierpont,  Longfellow,  Sprague, 
Holmes,  Dana,  Fitz-Greene  Halleck,  Lowell,  and  Willis, 
and  wound  up  with  a  very  charming  compliment  to  Mr. 
Bancroft.  Then  followed  letters  and  poems  from  Mrs. 
Julia  Ward  Howe,  Whittier,  Lowell,  Halleck,  and  one 
read  by  Oliver  Wendell  Holmes,  which  was  full  of  fine 
points. 

Then  came  the  artists  with  a  volume  of  sketches.  I 
remember  Cropsey,  Stone,  Huntington,  Lang,  Kensett, 
Hennessy,  Benson,  Durand,  Leutze,  Darley,  Hays,  Mc- 
Entee,  Yaux,  Hicks,  Launt  Thompson,  Church,  Hazel- 
tine,  Coleman,  Hall,  and  Cranch. 

It  was  a  delightful  ovation,  and  calculated  to  give  to 
every  listener  and  spectator  a  love  of  literature  and 
learning.  It  occurred  in  a  gloomy  moment  of  our  civil 
war,  but  it  was  enlivening  as  taking  our  minds  away 
for  a  moment  from  the  horrors  which  were  breaking 
our  hearts.  In  the  language  of  Bayard  Taylor's  noble 
hymn,  written  for  the  occasion  : 

"One  hour  be  silent,  sounds  of  war! 

Delay  the  battle  he  foretold, 
And  let  the  Bard's  triumphant  star 

Pour  down  from  heaven  its  mildest  gold ! 
Let  Fame,  that  plucks  but  laurel  now 

For  loyal  heroes,  turn  away, 
And  mine  to  crown  her  poet's  brow 

With  the  green  garland  of  the  bay." 

My  memories  of  Longfellow  shall  be  confined  to  three 
interviews.  One  on  the  Khine,  when  he  was  travelling 
with  his  daughters,  and  I  could  but  remember  The  Pil- 
grims of  the  Rhvne  and  his  own  pretty  prose  volume 
embodying  his  love  affair.  Again,  at  the  house  of 
George  Abbot  James,  at  Nahant,  where,  in  the  late 
seventies,  I  had  the  honor  of  meeting  at  lunch  Long- 


LONGFELLOW  131 

fellow,  Mr.  Tom  Appleton,  Mr.  Story,  Mr.  William 
Amory,  senior,  and  the  late  artist  Hamilton  "Wilde. 

Mr.  Longfellow,  already  old,  and  always  silent,  was 
beautiful  that  day,  and  as  charming  as  his  gentle  nature 
prompted  him  to  be.  Mr.  William  Amory  told  us  the 
long,  romantic  story  of  the  famous  law  trial  on  which 
he  was  associated  with  Webster.  It  concerned  the 
murder  of  an  old  Mr.  White  by  two  nephews,  one  of 
whom  killed  himself  in  prison,  and  it  was  upon  this 
occasion  that  Mr.  Webster  uttered  the  famous  dictum, 
*^  Suicide  is  confession."  I  am  ashamed  to  say  that  the 
rest  of  us  did  all  the  talking,  while  the  venerable  poet 
sat  and  mused.  He  was  engaged  on  the  great  poem 
which  appeared  in  Ilarjyer^s  soon  after,  in  which  he  de- 
scribes the  process  of  making  pottery.  But  what  he 
did  say  was  so  much  to  the  point  that  it  seemed  like 
nuggets  of  gold. 

A  part  of  Mr.  Longfellow's  charm  was  his  way  of 
listening;  another  charm  was  his  beauty,  which  was  re- 
markable. His  kindness  to  young  authors  has  passed 
into  a  proverb,  and  he  was  a  natural-born  gentleman. 
Another  beautiful  old  man  was  Mr.  William  Amory. 

While  Mr.  Amory  talked,  which  he  did  wonderfully, 
Mr.  Longfellow  listened  as  if  to  music.  When  he  had 
finished  his  reminiscences  of  Webster,  Mr,  Longfellow 
whispered  behind  his  hand,  "  It  is  hke  hearing  Atticus 
praise  Cicero ;  he  is  the  best  talker  in  Boston."  Mr. 
Tom  Appleton  was  wildly  funny,  and  kept  us  all  laugh- 
ing, including  Mr.  Longfellow,  who  greatly  admired  his 
brother-in-law.  Mr.  Appleton  was  amusing  us  by  a 
witty  account  of  how  Mr.  Longfellow  had  been  bored 
and  swindled  by  an  adventurer  and  adventuress.  To 
all  of  which  Mr.  Longfellow  only  said,  smiling,  "Tom 
is  a  poet,  you  know  -^  also  an  artist  and  a  romancer." 


132  AIT   EPISTLE   TO   POSTERITY 

Mr.  Story  dropped  a  few  pearls.  It  was  an  exquisite 
day  at  one  of  the  most  lovely  houses  on  the  sea.  Every 
one  was  cordial,  and  as  Mrs.  James  put  a  shawl  over  Mr. 
Longfellow's  shoulders  he  said,  "  The  world  is  in  tune." 
He  helped  to  make  it  so. 

The  third  interview  was  at  his  own  house,  where  he 
thanked  me  for  my  translation  of  Carcassonne^  which 
he  said  Bret  Harte  had  sent  to  him,  and  which  he  in- 
corporated in  his  volume.  Poems  of  Places.  There  was 
something  in  his  praise  which  the  heart  does  not  will- 
ingly let  die.    Yale, 


CHAPTER  VIII 

My  First  Visit  to  England— Chester  Cathedral— Sunshine  in  London 
— Westminster  Abbey  and  the  British  Museum — English  Art — 
At  the  English  Dinner-table — Our  American  Hospitality  an  In- 
herited Virtue — Oxford,  Kenilwortl'i,  and  Stratford-on-Avon — 
The  English  Attitude  towards  America. 

In  1869  I  went  to  England  for  the  first  time.  I  had 
no  mission,  political,  religious,  or  literary.  I  repre- 
sented nobody  but  myself.  V^hen  I  found  the  English 
people  kind,  courtly,  well-bred,  and  especially  polite  on 
the  ground  that  we  were  Americans,  I  could  not  but  be 
won.  "  Eemember,  you  are  taking  the  reflex  wave  of 
the  war,"  said  one  of  my  friends,  who  was  not  so  much 
fascinated  as  I  was.  No  matter  what  I  took,  it  was 
very  good,  and  "  mine  own." 

We  went  for  the  delicious  purposes  of  travel.  We 
wished  to  realize  the  reading  of  a  lifetime;  to  see 
the  Tower  and  Westminister  Abbey  and  Eastcheap;  to 
hear  Bow  Bells ;  to  see  the  Queen ;  to  look  at  Madame 
Tussaud's  waxworks.  Nothing  was  too  low  or  too  lofty 
for  our  omnivorous  appetites.  One  of  us  had  travelled 
before,  but  the  other  had  not.  But  we  both  enjoyed 
alike  her  hedgerows,  her  golden  pheasants  trooping 
through  the  grass,  her  deer  hiding  in  the  ferns,  her 
magnificent  old  oaks,  her  lordly  residences,  and  her 
rose-embowered  cottages. 

It  was  a  gracious  June  day,  a  red-letter  da}^  in  my  hum- 
ble annalSjWhen  we  found  ourselves  sailing  up  the  Mersey. 


134  AN   EPISTLE   TO   POSTERITY 

We  had  had  a  glorious  view  of  the  romantic  Irish  coast 
the  evening  before  and  all  the  morning,  and  I  thought 
it  a  fine  sight  when  Liverpool,  proud  commercial  town, 
lay  before  me.  I  did  not  find  Liverpool  ugly.  Her 
stately  public  buildings,  broad  streets,  public  squares, 
and  noble  statues  redeem  her  from  the  charge ;  and 
after  a  bath,  a  nap,  and  an  excellent  dinner  at  the  com- 
fortable Adelphi  we  took  a  drive  to  a  park  in  the  en- 
virons, which  we  found  charming.  They  say  the  first 
cathedral  you  see  remains  with  you  forever  as  the  ca- 
thedral of  the  world.  Perhaps  this  first  glimpse  of  an 
English  June  and  of  a  European  park  so  favorably  im- 
pressed me  because  it  was  the  first,  but  I  am  convinced 
it  was  charming;  so  w^as  the  fresh-looking,  pleasant- 
spoken  English  lady  whom  we  met  w^alking  in  the  park, 
and  who  so  kindly  and  even  learnedly  answered  our 
questions  about  the  new  trees  and  flowers.  And  this 
English  lady,  who  so  agreeably  surprised  us  by  her  af- 
fability and  courtesy,  was  a  type  of  all  our  accidental 
acquaintances.  "His  speech  bewrayeth  him,"  and  our 
accent  generally  brought  out, "  I  see  you  are  Ameri- 
cans ";  or  if  not,  w^e  had  but  to  say  so,  and  our  ques- 
tions were  answered  with  a  ready  politeness  which  it 
is  but  fair  to  say  English  people  do  not  seem  to  show 
to  each  other.  I  suppose  the  great  differences  of  rank 
necessarily  bring  about  a  certain  stiffness.  We  took  our 
first  bath  in  antiquity  at  Chester,  where  we  spent  a  Sun- 
day. The  service  in  that  venerable  cathedral — those 
boy  voices  in  the  choir — shall  I  ever  hear  anything  like 
it  this  side  the  golden  gates  ? 

Time  should  be  imaged  with  a  paint-brush  instead  of 
a  scythe ;  he  know^s  how  to  wield  the  former  even  bet- 
ter than  the  latter.  What  he  has  adorned  let  no  man 
attempt  to  copy.    I  dare  say  those  ruined  cloisters  were 


MY   FIRST  VISIT  TO   ENGLAND  135 

very  commonplace  in  their  youth ;  now  time  has  so 
judiciously  colored  them,  gnawed  them,  hung  them  with 
ivy  and  mosses  and  lichens,  that  they  are  beautiful,  with 
a  tender,  perennial  loveliness.  Wandering  through  the 
cathedral,  we  found,  strange  to  say,  a  memorial  stone  to 
one  Thomas  Phillipse,  who  was  much  praised  for  having 
remained  loyal  during  the  "  late  rebellion  in  his  Majes- 
ty's colonies  of  North  America,  by  which  he  lost  much 
valuable  land  and  all  his  riches,"  etc.,  etc.  Thomas 
Phillipse  lost  the  goodly  town  of  Yonkers,  on  the 
Hudson,  and  many  acres  besides,  and  gained  the  ugly 
name  of  Tory  over  here ;  but  there  he  lies  in  the  odor 
of  sanctity  in  Chester  Cathedral,  which  is  some  com- 
pensation. 

We  went  up  to  London  through  Shrewsbury,  bought 
some  "  Shrewsbury  cake,"  and  thought  of  Falstaff  fight- 
ing an  hour  by  Shrewsbury  clock.  As  we  were  talking 
and  laughing  over  the  former,  a  companion  of  ours  in 
the  railway  carriage,  who  proved  to  be  an  English  man- 
ufacturer, and  who  had  been  talking  of  America  to  us, 
said,  "  And  so  you  know  Shakespeare  over  there,  and 
Byron  too?"  Our  national  vanity  got  another  shock 
after  this  from  a  young  lady  who  asked  us  if  we  had 
ever  heard  the  music  of  Mendelssohn  and  Beethoven. 
However,  our  friend  the  manufacturer  was  extremely 
kind.  He  showed  us  the  "  Wrekin  "  in  Shropshire,  well 
known  to  all  ballad -singers  by  the  song  "  Kound  the 
Wrekin,"  which  he  said  embodied  a  Shropshire  custom, 
j^ot  being  a  Shropshire  man  himself,  he  told  us  that  the 
Shropshire  people  thought  the  world  of  themselves  and 
were  the  most  self-sufficient  people  in  England. 

We  glided  past  the  smoky  chimneys  of  Wolverhamp- 
ton, and  finally,  after  a  railway  journey  of  four  or  five 
hours,  rich  in  pictures  to  us,  reached  London. 


136  AN    EPISTLE    TO    POSTERITY 

I  was  awakened  my  first  morning  in  London  by  the 
brilliant  strains  of  the  band  of  the  Coldstream  Guards, 
who  were  marching,  as  they  do  daily,  from  guard 
mounting  to  St.  James's  Palace,  where  they  play  de- 
lightfully. I  should  like  to  stop  and  say  something 
about  the  precision  and  brilHancy  of  this  band,  but  I 
forbear,  lest  my  geese  be  accused  of  being  all  swans. 

There  was  a  bright  sun  shining.  Buckingham  Palace 
was  in  front  of  our  windows,  and  shortly  the  well-ap- 
pointed equipages,  unsurpassed  in  the  world,  began  to 
drive  by.  At  one  o'clock  we  went  to  Eotten  Row  to 
see  the  equestrians.  It  is  a  pretty  sight,  were  it  only 
for  the  horses.  At  first  we  were  very  much  disappoint- 
ed in  English  beauty,  but  after  a  while  the  pretty  faces 
and  majestic  figures  began  to  reach  us.  The  men  are 
magnificent — the  young  men  tall,  well  formed,  and  ad- 
mirably dressed  ;  the  old  men  positively  beautiful,  with 
their  fresh  complexions,  white  hair,  and  admirable 
neatness.  Nothing  struck  me  more  than  this,  and  we 
might  copy  it  to  advantage  here.  As  an  Englishman 
grows  older  he  becomes  more  and  more  careful  in  his 
dress. 

To  say  how  London  opened  itself  to  us  in  the  next  six 
Tveeks  would  be  to  write  an  encyclopaedia.  First  itself 
— its  illimitable  extent;  its  magnificence;  its  gay, courtly, 
rich  life  ;  its  historical  points ;  its  inexhaustible  stores  of 
museum,  picture-gallery,  library,  church,  abbey,  tower, 
everything.  What  a  city  it  is!  And  this  was  the 
glooni}^,  foggy,  melancholy  city  which  every  American 
had  told  me  to  avoid,  to  hurry  through,  and  get  to 
Paris !  I  have  now  seen  them  both,  and  I  find  London 
in  June  superior  in  attraction  to  Paris  in  any  month, 
beautiful,  gay  capital  that  it  is.  I  must  acknowledge 
that  we  were  in  England  in  an  exceptional  summer  as 


WESTMINSTER  ABBEY  137 

to  weather.  The  weather  was  brilliant,  warm,  and 
clear.  Had  it  rained  all  the  time  my  enthusiasm  might 
have  been  dampened. 

One  day  we  consecrated  to  the  venerable  abbey,  of 
course.  JS'o  amount  of  description  can  render  this 
threadbare  to  us.  I  gazed  with  as  much  emotion  on  the 
beautiful  profile  of  Mary  Queen  of  Scots  as  if  I  were 
the  first  person  who  had  ever  wept  over  her  "  strange, 
eventful  history."  Nothing  is  disagreeable  here  but  the 
old  vergers,  who  trooped  us  round  like  sheep,  and  who 
gave  us  the  most  familiar  historical  facts  with  great  de- 
liberateness,  as  if  .they  feared  we  should  "  dilate  with 
the  wrong  emotion."  I  was  pleased  to  see  a  full-length 
statue  of  Mrs.  Siddons  in  Westminster  Abbey.  Since 
the  Romish  Church  denies  Christian  sepulture  to  actors, 
it  was  pleasing  to  see  this  proof  of  the  superior  liberal- 
ity of  her  English  daughter.  I  stopped  a  moment  be- 
fore the  bust  of  Thackeray.  He  was  the  only  one  of 
those  immortals  whom  I  had  seen,  and  I  rejoiced  as  I 
looked  upon  the  speaking  marble  that  I  had  known  and 
listened  to  that  great  genius. 

Westminster  Abbey  is  thoroughly  Saxon ;  its  archi- 
tecture suggests  a  forest.  Its  stones  seem  to  have 
been  dug  from  primeval  quarries;  those  dark  rafters 
hewn  from  Saxon  oak,  smoked  perhaps  by  druidical 
sacrifices.  Those  Gothic  lines  in  their  upward  flight 
tell  us  that  nature  is  herself  a  church,  even  as  she 
is  a  tomb.  Westminster  Abbey  is  nature  crystallized 
into  a  conventional  form  by  man,  with  his  sorrows,  his 
joys,  his  failures,  and  his  seeking  for  the  Great  Spirit. 
It  is  a  frozen  requiem,  with  a  nation's  prayer  ever  in 
dumb  music  ascending:. 

To  look  at  and  properly  appreciate  the  British  Mu- 
seum is  the  work  of  a  lifetime.    We  gave  it  one  day — 


138  AN   EPISTLE   TO   POSTEKITY 

just  enough  to  set  our  teeth  on  edge.  There  I  remem- 
ber a  letter  of  Sir  Walter  Scott  denying  emphatically 
the  authorship  of  Waverley.  I  afterwards  had  the  pleas- 
ure to  meet  Mr.  Jones,  the  curator  of  this  magnificent 
place,  and  I  begged  him  to  hide  that  away,  for  it  is  not 
pleasant  to  see  Walter  Scott's  name  appended  to  a  lie. 
"  Oh !  he  was  a  writer  of  fiction,  you  know,"  was  his 
answer. 

The  ISTational  Gallery  we  visited  on  a  private  day, 
thanks  to  the  courtesy  of  Sir  John  Bowring,  whose  ac- 
complished wife  and  daughter  we  found  copying  pict- 
ures with  great  ability.  This  accomplishment,  so  rare 
here,  is  an  almost  universal  one  in  England ;  all  the 
educated  women  sketch  well,  and  some  paint  admi- 
rably. The  Ilogarths  interested  me  immensely.  I  had 
no  idea  he  had  such  a  charm  of  color.  Plis  pictures  are 
as  fresh  to-day  as  when  they  were  painted.  I  looked  long 
and  earnestl}^  at  the  Turners,  and  found  that  I  could  get 
to  understand  them  after  a  while.  But  Turner  is  like 
classical  music  and  Browning's  poetry  —  he  requires 
study.  The  valuable  Raphaels,  Correggios,  and  other 
treasures  of  this  glorious  gallery  have  been  too  often 
described  for  me  to  add  a  word.  The  water-color  gal- 
leries were  our  next  great  delight.  We  found  these 
pictures  exquisitely  beautiful  and  choice.  The  Eng- 
lish landscape  lends  itself  naturally  to  water -color. 
When  I  afterwards  paid  a  visit  to  an  English  country 
seat  and  saw,  as  I  sat  at  breakfast,  the  old  family 
chapel  hung  with  ivy,  just  framed  by  the  w^indow,  I 
said.  ''There  you  have  a  water -color  arranged  to 
your  hand."  I  imagine  this  lack  of  neatly  finished  ob- 
ject is  the  reason  we  have  so  few  water-colorists  in  the 
United  States.  Our  grand  distances  and  atmospheric 
efl;ects,  the  absence  of  mullioned  windows  hung  with 


SIGHTS    OF   LONDON  139 

ivy  and  of  other  architectural  beauties,  undoubtedly 
stint  us  as  to  water-colors  and  therefore  make  oil*  the 
most  convenient  medium.  Our  American  landscape- 
painters — Kensett,  Church,  Gifford,  Bierstadt — have  no 
superiors  in  Europe  in  oils,  if,  indeed,  they  have  many 
equals. 

I  saw  the  yearly  exhibition  at  the  Eoyal  Academy. 
Of  it,  I  remember  one  of  Landseer's — a  curious  picture 
— eagles  attacking  swans,  a  bloody,  cruel,  unequal  fight. 
Then  I  saw  a  "  Vanessa,"  by  Millais,  the  deserted  love 
of  Dean  Swift — another  unequal  fight.  She  was  repre- 
sented a  tall,  proud,  unhappy-looking  creature,  a  beauty, 
and  in  the  handsomest  brocade  that  ever  was  woven  or 
painted.  That  brocade  alone  should  have  insured  a 
large  female  attendance  at  this  exhibition. 

Westminster  Hall  I  remember  with  peculiar  pleasure, 
and  also  the  richly  decorated  St.  Stephen's  Chapel,  under 
the  House  of  Commons,  of  no  use  to  anybody,  but  as 
rich  as  an  illuminated  missal.  I  was  afterwards  shut  up, 
as  becomes  my  dangerous  character,  in  a  wired  den  over 
the  House  of  Commons — and  heard  Mr.  Gladstone,  Mr. 
Disraeli,  Mr.  Lowe,  and  Dr.  Ball ;  also  some  men  of  lesser 
note.  Mr.  Gladstone  speaks  with  singular  clearness  and 
elegance,  and  I  noticed  none  of  that  hesitancy  so  often 
attributed  to  English  speakers.  Disraeli  had  just  been 
defeated  for  the  premiership, 

A  permission  to  the  House  of  Lords  was  not  so  easily 
obtained,  for  it  was  the  height  of  the  debate  on  the  Irish 
Church  Bill,  and  the  peeresses  demanded  their  right  to 
every  one  of  the  few  available  seats.  However,  that 
came  in  time,  and  I  was  so  fortunate  as  to  hear  Earl 
Granville,  the  Lord  Chancellor,  Lord  John  Kussell,  and 

*  This  was  my  opiuion  in  1869. 


140  AN    EPISTLE   TO    POSTEEITT 

some  others,  on  an  interesting  subject — that  of  life  peer- 
age. There  was  a  desire,  as  I  was  told  by  a  member  of 
the  House  of  Commons,  to  infuse  some  new  life  into  the 
"  Lords  "  by  the  introduction  of  a  limited  number  of  life 
peers,  men  who  did  not  desire  or  who  had  not  the  wealth 
to  aspire  to  ^'  founding  a  family."  The  opponents  of  the 
case  quoted  some  good  things  from  English  history, 
of  men  who  had  desired  title  simply  that  they  might 
give  it  to  a  son,  and  the  question  of  life  peerage  was 
lost. 

The  House  of  Lords,  architecturally,  is  a  magnificent 
room,  and  the  dignity,  quiet,  and  repose  of  the  scene 
made  me  unwillingly  acknowledge  that  the  Senate  of 
the  United  States  might  possibly  improve  its  manners. 
Perhaps  in  our  desire  for  simplicity,  absence  of  title,  or 
badge  of  office  we  may  have  thrown  over  too  much. 
The  drives  out  of  London  shared,  of  course,  in  our  pleas- 
ures. Hampton  Court,  Windsor,  Kichmond,  the  Crys- 
tal Palace  at  Sydenham,  came  in  their  turn.  I  walked 
through  a  half-mile  of  roses  at  a  rose  show  at  Sydenham, 
and  saw  that  imperial  flower  for  the  first  time,  for  we 
cannot  grow  such  roses  here.  The  rose  in  America  is 
dwindled  and  thin  compared  with  the  English  rose.  It 
has  suffered  from  transplantation,  as  the  human  animal 
did  for  two  centuries.  Now  the  human  animal  is  be- 
ginning to  grow  broad  and  rosy  and  show  his  English 
origin.     I  hope  the  roses  may  too. 

Of  the  English  dinner-table  we  had  a  pretty  fair  ex- 
perience. Had  our  indebtedness  to  English  hospitality 
been  limited  to  the  dinners  alone,  we  should  have  re- 
turned overwhelmed  with  a  sense  of  unrequitable  favors 
bestowed  ;  but  when  all  these  dinners  were  followed  up 
by  other  kindnesses,  we  owned  ourselves  hopelessly  bank- 
rupt.    For  every  letter  a  dozen  doors  flew  open;  for 


ENGLISH    HOSPITALITY  141 

every  friend  you  make  you  sow  dragons'  teeth  for  innu- 
merable other  friends,  and  each  one  is  kinder  than  the 
last.  Some  of  my  new  friends  spoke  handsomely  of 
American  hospitality.  I  was  compelled  to  say,  "It 
must  be  an  inherited  virtue." 

They  can  be  more  hospitable  than  we,  these  fortunate 
people.  They  have  a  far  more  highly  organized  system 
of  domestic  service;  they  have  immense  wealth;  they 
have  that  regular,  graduated  society  wherein  every  man 
and  woman  knows  his  or  her  place ;  and  whatever  we, 
as  republicans,  may  say  as  to  the  so-called  snobbery  of 
English  people,  I  have  seen  something  like  it  at  home. 
It  is  better  to  pay  court  to  a  queen  (who  to  them  is 
abstract  England)  or  to  a  duke  with  a  "long  pedigree" 
than  to  worship,  as  we  too  often  do,  some  unworthy  per- 
son whose  wealth  is  his  sole  passport  into  society.  I 
believe  that  a  habit  of  respect  is  good  for  the  human 
race — "  It  blesseth  him  that  gives  and  him  that  takes," 
and  it  produces  in  England  such  manners  in  the  trades- 
people, servants,  innkeepers,  and,  in  fact,  in  all  who  serve 
you,  that  I  would  fain  become  a  student  and  a  copyist  of 
the  better  specimens,  that  I  might  become  in  my  turn  a 
teacher  "of  the  same"  to  the  dominant  race  who  drive 
our  carriages  and  rule  our  households.  I  do  not  wonder 
that  American  women  like  Europe  and  are  happier  there 
than  here.  Women  are  more  sensitive  than  men  in  this 
matter  of  respectful  attendance ;  and  thej'^  receive  so 
little  of  it  here  from  our  so-called  servants  that  the  per- 
fect deference  and  good  breeding  of  that  class  in  the 
older  countries  is  a  happiness  in  itself. 

We  reluctantly  tore  ourselves  from  the  delights  of 
ISTilsson  and  the  opera  at  Covent  Garden,  and  all  the 
theatres,  and  from  the  parks  and  drives  and  dinners  of 
London,  for  fresh  fields  and  pastures  new.    We  wanted 


142  AN   EPISTLE   TO   POSTEEITY 

to  see  Oxford,  Stratford-on-Avon,  "Warwick,  Kenilworth, 
York,  Edinburgh,  and  all  that  glorious  company. 

Oxford  we  saw  out  of  term-time.  There  w^ere  no 
gowns  and  caps  walking  about,  no  races  on  the  Isis. 
But  what  a  regal  old  town  it  is  !  How  we  enjoyed  the 
architecture — the  quaint  old  gargoyles,  the  delicious  gar- 
dens of  Merton,  Magdalen,  and  St.  John's  !  How  heavy 
the  air  was  with  the  perfume  of  the  lime-trees,  then  in 
full  bloom !  Nowhere  in  England  is  the  turf  more  green, 
the  English  landscape  purer  or  more  characteristic. 
The  air  is  eloquent  with  learning  and  splendid  names. 
"We  drove  to  Blenheim  and  enjoyed  its  magnificence, 
tried  to  realize  that  we  were  in  Woodstock  Park ;  but 
here  two  sets  of  reminiscences  clashed,  and  it  was  hard 
to  define  where  Fair  Kosamond  ended  and  the  stormy 
Sarah,  Duchess  of  Marlborough,  began.  "We  drove  home 
by  Godstow  Abbey,  where  the  frail  favorite  ended  her 
career;  and  we  finished  the  day  by  a  visit  to  a  sweet 
English  rectory  right  out  of  Birket  Foster,  all  strawber- 
ries and  roses  and  diamond-paned  windoAvs.  Our  host 
was  full  of  the  legends  of  the  spot,  and  told  me  he  had 
an  apple  in  his  garden  called  the  "Fair  Eosamond," 
which  shows  (for  he  was  a  divine)  how  meritorious  a 
thing  it  is  to  be  pretty. 

From  Leamington  we  drove  over  to  Stratford-on-Avon, 
on  one  of  the  loveliest  summer  days  I  remember,  and 
.lunched  in  "Washington  Irving's  parlor  at  the  "Eed 
House."  We  afterwards  walked  to  Shakespeare's  house, 
where  we  found  five  Americans  before  us.  We  were  not 
surprised,  though  perhaps  our  national  vanity  was  a  little 
gratified,  when  the  sensible  old  lady  who  acts  as  custo- 
dian took  down  an  American  edition  of  Shakespeare  and 
told  us  how  highly  the  English  scholars  appreciated  the 
work  of  our  Shakespearian  scholar,  Richard  Grant  White. 


143 

We  attempted  to  walk  to  the  church  where  Shake- 
speare lies  buried,  but  the  heat  overcoming  one  lady  of 
our  party,  we  sought  shelter  on  a  friendly  door-step  in 
the  shade,  while  the  gentlemen  went  back  for  carriages. 
The  door  behind  us  softly  opened  and  revealed  the  feat- 
ures of  an  elderly  lady,  who  kindly  invited  us  to  enter, 
saying,  "  I  am  sure  the  rector  of  the  parish  would  not 
like  to  see  ladies  reduced  to  sitting  on  his  door-step. 
Pray  walk  in."  We  accepted  the  gracious  invitation, 
and  were  soon  rewarded  by  the. presence  of  the  rector, 
a  good-looking,  well-bred  man.  He  told  us  that  of  all 
the  visitors  to  Shakespeare's  tomb  the  Americans  con- 
stituted one-sixth  ;  that  they  were  by  far  the  most  inter- 
ested in  the  visit.  He  preached  every  Sunday  in  the 
famous  church  where  Shakespeare's  bust  and  body  are 
enshrined ;  and  he  knew  Miss  Bacon  well,  but  was,  I 
thought,  a  little  astonished  that  she  lodged  at  a  shoe- 
maker's. He  gave  me  some  local  details  of  the  place, 
and  offered  us  refreshments  with  true  English  hospi- 
tality. 

The  old  church  is  delightfully  situated  close  to  the 
banks  of  the  Avon.    We  went  in,  read  the  inscription  : 

"Good  friend,  for  Jesus'  sake  forbear  !" 

and  looked  at  that  wonderful  bust  which  gives  us  all  we 
can  see  of  the  most  astounding  genius  the  world  has 
ever  known. 

We  drove  away  silently,  too  full  of  delicious  reverie 
to  talk.  Nothing  roused  us  till  our  coachman  said,  two 
or  three  miles  from  Stratford,  "  Charlecotes,  the  seat 
of  Sir  Thomas  Lucy ;  now  the  property  of  Mr.  Lucy. 
Strangers  not  permitted  to  enter."  So  the  family  keep 
up  the  traditional  inhospitality.  We  allowed  our  eyes 
to  enter,  however,  and  saw  through  the  barred  gate  the 


144  AN   EPISTLE   TO   POSTERITY 

beautiful  long,  low  Elizabethan  house,  and  some  of  the 
finest  elms  in  England.  We  drove  home  by  Stone- 
leigh  Abbey,  another  charming  specimen  house,  where 
are  some  interesting  relics  of  Lord  Byron,  but  we  were 
not  able  to  stop  and  see  them.  The  owner,  Mr.  Leigh, 
however,  permits  his  house  and  treasures  to  be  seen  at 
certain  hours  by  the  public. 

Kenilworth,  Warwick  Castle,  Guy's  Cliff,  afford  an- 
other day's  drive  from  Leamington ;  and  I  insisted  on 
going  through  the  old  town  of  Coventry,  for  the  sake 
of  Godiva  and  Peeping  Tom,  whose  luckless  effigy  is 
carefully  arranged  at  a  window.  But,  alas !  Coventry 
is  a  modern,  prosperous  manufacturing  town ;  and  had  it 
not  been  for  a  wonderful  old  church  we  should  have 
been  wofully  disappointed.  At  Warwick  Castle,  where 
are  the  two  best  Vandykes  of  Charles  I.,  I  saw  the  only 
relic  of  Oliver  Cromwell  which  I  could  find  in  England. 
It  was  a  cast  of  his  face  after  death. 

Kenilworth  is  a  dreadful  disappointment.  It  is  too 
much  of  a  ruin.  You  can  scarcely,  even  with  Sir  Walter 
in  your  hand,  reconstruct  that  famous  banquet-hall,  of 
which  the  floor  and  the  roof  are  gone.  I  found  Amy 
Kobsart's  staircase.  She  is  the  most  real  person  con- 
nected with  Kenilworth. 

York  Minster  was  one  of  my  great  joys.  It  is  the 
only  cathedral  I  have  seen  in  England  or  on  the  Conti- 
nent that  can  be  seen.  It  has  no  ugly,  unsightly,  intru- 
sive buildings  between  you  and  it.  It  stands  majesti- 
cally in  its  own  green  park,  glorious,  complete — a  poem 
and  a  history  in  itself. 

We  could  never  become  accustomed  to  the  beauty  of 
England — the  finish,  the  perfection  of  the  w^hole  thing, 
all  so  agreeable  to  an  eye  used  to  our  own  incomplete- 
ness.   We  have  not  been  touched  up  by  time  yet ;  and, 


ENGLISH   PEOPLE   IGNORANT   OF   THE   UNITED   STATES     145 

indeed,  where  will  be  our  old  cathedrals,  our  Warwick 
Castles,  to  touch  up?  "We  can  never  have  the  green 
turf  or  the  lovely  flowers;  our  torrid  summers  and 
frigid  winters  forbid  it.  We  are  a  vast  country  with 
few  people ;  they  are  a  small  country  with  many  peo- 
ple. They  can  afford  to  have  their  railway  embank- 
ments sodded,  their  little  stations  each  a  flower  garden. 
With  us  those  enormous  public  works  must  remain  for- 
ever rough,  great  scars  on  the  face  of  nature.  We  must 
get  our  beauty  in  other  things,  and  leave  to  England  her 
peerless  enamel  of  green  grass,  brilliant  flowers,  her  gray 
ruins,  and  graceful  ivy. 

I  was  amused,  sometimes  a  little  offended,  to  find  how 
little  English  people  knew  of  the  United  States.  It 
seemed  impossible  to  believe  that  two  steamers  a  week 
ran  between  Liverpool  and  New  York,*  each  freighted 
to  the  water's  edge ;  and  yet  the  English  ladies  would 
ask  me  if  we  "  ever  had  ice-cream  in  New  York,"  if  we 
"  had  frequent  fires  because  it  was  built  of  wood,"  etc. ; 
and  they  would  smile  incredulously  Avhen  I  said  it  had 
been  against  the  law  for  forty  years  to  build  a  wooden 
house  in  New  York.  And  the  worst  of  it  is,  they  do  not 
care  to  know  much  in  the  social  way  about  the  United 
States.  The  stream  of  thought  flows  steadily  from 
England  here,  not  from  here  there.  They  are  very 
kind,  very  friendly,  interested  in  a  general  way,  and 
consider  us  a  great,  wonderful,  unknown  sort  of  Austra- 
lia, and  that  is  all. 

One  thing  they  do  respect  and  admire  in  us — the 
way  we  are  paying  our  national  debt ;  but  they  cannot 
understand  (and  who  could  explain  to  them  ?)  the  curi- 
ous combinations  brought  about  by  our  system  of  poli- 

^*  This  was  in  1869. 


146  AN   EPISTLE   TO   POSTERITY 

tics  and  by  our  republican  institutions.  "  Who  are  your 
best  people  ?"  was  a  favorite  and  unanswerable  question. 
It  is  a  strange  and  significant  fact  that  Americans  who 
travel  in  Europe  are  more  amazed  at  the  other  Ameri- 
cans they  meet  there  than  at  any  other  people  who 
travel.  So  we  may  well  stop  trying  to  describe  our- 
selves to  foreigners.  We  are  too  vast,  too  heterogene- 
ous.   Lord  Houghton  said,  "  Don't  try." 

One  question  I  always  asked  and  never  got  answered 
satisfactorily.  It  was :  "  Why  did  England  take  the 
side  of  the  South  ?"  I  hoped  to  receive  some  philosophi- 
cal solution  of  this  great  problem.  Sir  John  Bowring 
said,  "  She  did  not."  Dr.  Mackay,  the  poet,  gave  me 
a  witty  answer :  "  Because  England  loves  all  rebels 
except  at  home !"  But,  with  all  this,  they  were  most 
kindly,  most  hospitable  ;  they  seemed  to  feel,  in  spite  of 
themselves,  a  sort  of  brotherhood.  They  take  trouble 
for  you,  are  delighted  if  you  enjoy  England ;  take  pleas- 
ure in  opening  wide  those  splendid  doors  within  whose 
folds  are  hidden  so  much  luxury,  so  much  comfort.  The 
conversation  at  an  English  dinner-table,  cordial,  refined, 
often  learned,  never  (to  my  hearing)  commonplace ;  the 
low,  deliciously  musical  voices  of  Englishwomen  (would 
that  they  could  be  imported !) ;  the  straightforward, 
pleasant  talk  of  the  men — all  these  things  go  to  form 
a  society  such  as  we  cannot  have  in  this  country  for 
many,  many  years  to  come,  if  ever. 

This  was  written  in  1869,  after  my  first  visit.  Since 
then  I  have  spent  five  seasons  in  London  and  have  al- 
most lived  a  year  in  England,  but  I  do  not  know  that  I 
could  improve  upon  my  early  recollections ;  at  any  rate, 
I  am  glad  that  I  saw  England  then  as  I  have  always 
seen  it — kind,  hospitable,  and  most  agreeable. 


CHAPTER  IX 

The  Social  Side  of  London— Sir  William  Stirling  -  Maxwell  and  Sir 
John  Bowring— Mr.  Motley  and  General  Adam  Badeau— A  Visit 
to  Hampton  Court — Racial  Characteristics  and  Differentiation — 
The  Lord  Byron  Scandal  Again— A^  Page  of  Unwritten  History — 
Across  the  Channel  to  Paris. 

The  first  person  to  call  on  us  on  our  arrival  in  London 
was  General  Adam  Badeau,  our  Secretary  of  Legation, 
who  was  of  great  use  to  us.  I  had  known  him  since  he 
was  a  young  newspaper-man,  who  used  to  pause  admir- 
ingly before  Mr.  Bancroft  at  the  opera  to  get  a  word  or 
two  from  the  great  historian,  and  who  also  had  a  word 
or  two  of  chat  with  me  about  society,  for  which  he  was 
ambitious.  After  going  to  the  war  he  had  painfully 
climbed  up  my  steps  with  his  crutches,  having  been 
wounded  in  the  foot — poor  fellow  ! — and  he  had  done 
me  the  greatest  of  favors  in  making  General  Grant  ray 
friend.  He  had  a  decided  talent  for  society  and  was  a 
generous  and  discriminating  entertainer,  as  well  as  a  man 
of  ability. 

The  next  day  we  called  on  Mr.  Motley,  our  minister, 
and  he  immediately  returned  our  call ;  and  from  that 
moment,  after  presenting  our  letters,  we  were  launched 
on  a  sea  of  dinners  and  fetes,  balls  and  social  functions. 
I  remember  Sir  William  Stirling-Maxwell,  Lord  Hough- 
ton, Sir  John  Bowring,  Tom  Taylor,  the  dramatist ;  Sir 
Harry  and  Lady  Yerney,  Mr.  Beresford  (at  Hampton 
Court),  and  Mr.  Jlolford  as  among  our  earliest  friends. 


148  AN    EPISTLE   TO   POSTEEITY 

"We  had  letters  to  Dean  Stanley,  to  the  Bishop  of  Lon- 
don, to  the  Bishop  of  Chester,  and  to  the  Bishop  of 
Kochester,  from  our  bishop  Horatio  Potter,  of  New 
York ;  and  we  had  our  own  Mr.  Motley  and  General 
Badeau,  who  never  forgot  us  for  a  moment. 

The  presentations  to  the  Queen  were  over  for  the 
season  (it  was  late  in  June) ;  bat  we  did  not  miss  them, 
as  we  had  all  we  could  do.  I  remember  balancing  my 
regret  with  the  thought  that  I  should  have  another  day 
for  sight-seeing.  I  think  now,  if  I  were  to  do  it  all  over 
again,  I  should  always  devote  the  first  season  in  London 
to  sight-seeing,  the  second  to  society,  the  third  to  a  judi- 
cious mixture  of  the  two ;  for  when  doors  are  opened  to 
one  which  never  may  be  thrown  open  again  it  seems 
cruel  and  absurd  to  one's  self  to  not  seize  the  opportu- 
nity to  know  those  who  are  eminent  in  that  courtly 
world  which  so  few  have  entered,  but  which  is  so  well 
worth  seeing. 

Sir  William  Stirling- Maxwell  was  a  man  whose  ac- 
quaintance was  to  be  dearly  prized.  Charles  Astor  Bris- 
ted  had  introduced  us  to  him,  and  he  seemed  to  find  no 
trouble  too  great,  no  kindness  too  elaborate,  to  take  for 
us.  Through  him  we  saw  all  the  great  balls,  the  grand 
functions,  excepting  those  of  royalty.  He  gave  us  din- 
ners himself,  at  which  we  met  the  choicest  people  in 
society.  I  remember  his  intellectual  wife.  Lady  Anna 
Stirling-Maxwell  (afterwards  she  met  the  dreadful  fate 
of  Mrs.  Longfellow),  and  Sir  Andrew  and  Lady  Bu- 
chanan, and  Lady  Emily  Hamilton,  a  beautiful  woman, 
the  sister  of  Lady  Anna ;  and,  better  than  all,  the  Hon. 
Mrs.  Norton,  whom  I  had  been  worshipping  as  an  au- 
thoress since  I  was  thirteen.  She  was  still  handsome,  al- 
though she  told  us  her  age  and  that  she  had  just  had  the 
scarlet-fever !     The  Khedive  was  in  London — Ismail,  the 


MR.  MOTLEY   AND    DEAN   STANLEY  149 

hero  of  the  canal  and  sponsor  for  Ismailia.  Sir  William 
managed  it  that  we  should  see  some  of  the  festivals  in 
his  honor.  London  depends  on  the  opening  of  a  single 
door,  and  more  than  one  such  admirable  friend  opened 
the  door  for  us.  Where  everybody  is  kindly  disposed, 
your  heart  must  be  a  bitter  one  if  you  are  not  pleased. 

General  Badeau  had  been  in  London  long  enough  to 
realize  our  unexpected  good  fortune  and  to  congratulate 
ns  on  it.  Mr.  Motley  was,  I  fear,  secretly  pleased  that 
we  did  not  demand  anything  of  him,  the  more  so  as  he 
had  just  had  bad  luck  at  Vienna  and  some  troublesome 
experiences  in  London.  He  was  one  of  the  most  beau- 
tiful of  men,  as  well  as  one  of  the  simplest,  most  agree- 
able, and  most  attractive.  I  had  neVer  seen  him  in 
America.  I  am  glad  to  think  that  I  saw  him  where  he 
was  so  honored,  and  where  he  so  honored  America. 

Dean  Stanley  took  us  through  Westminster  Abbey 
with  one  of  his  smaller  parties,  and  threw  the  illumina- 
tion of  his  knowledge  into  the  dark  corners. 

The  promptitude  of  English  hospitality  rather  alarmed 
us.  Sir  John  Bowring  had  told  the  Bishop  of  Eochester 
that  we  had  letters  to  him  from  Bishop  Potter,  and  he 
immediately  asked  us  to  his  house  for  three  days !  Bishop 
Jacobson,  of  Chester,  wrote  three  letters  of  introduction 
for  us  while  we  stood  in  the  library  of  the  Athenaeum, 
which  were  of  great  service  to  us  at  Oxford  and  at  York 
Minster  and  at  Canterbury,  and  indeed  everywhere  else. 

And  so  we  were  passed  along.  One  of  our  most 
enjoyable  visits  was  to  Sir  Harry  and  Lady  Yerney  at 
their  noble  old  house  at  Claydon.  Lady  Yerney,  a  sis- 
ter of  Florence  Nightingale,  was  an  author,  a  botanist,  a 
very  charming  woman,  and  a  good  artist.  She  had  dil- 
igently compiled  all  the  history  of  the  Yerney  family, 
and  we  saw  some  rare  family  portraits — one  of  Sir  Ed- 


150  AN   EPISTLE   TO   POSTERITY 

wardYerney,  who  fell  at  Edge  Hill;  and  Sir  Harry 
showed  us  the  ring  which  Sir  Edward's  servant  brought 
home  from  his  dead  hand. 

Another  visit  was  to  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Beresford  at  Hamp- 
ton Court.  Mr.  Beresford  was  the  warden  of  the  tennis 
court,  an  honorary  office  that  gave  him  a  residence  in 
the  old  palace  where  the  Queen  lodges  her  old  servants. 
It  was  a  picturesque  home,  and  gave  upon  the  garden 
of  Anne  Bolevn.  Some  strawberries  from  this  sacred 
enclosure  were  added  to  our  luncheon.  Mr.  Beresford 
had  been  a  friend  and  admirer  of  George  lY.,  and,  I 
think,  the  Tory  "  whipper-in "  during  one  session  of 
Parliament.  He  had  also  been  an  under  secretary  of 
state,  and  was  a  fine  old  prejudiced  Englishman,  of  a 
type  which  Dickens  would  have  worshipped — most  gen- 
tlemanly, gouty,  and  hospitable.  We  saw  Hampton 
Court  under  his  auspices  thoroughly,  but  he  was  very 
glad  when  he  found  that  we  did  not  wish  him  to  take 
us  to  see  the  state  apartments  or  the  Sir  Peter  Lely 
beauties ;  that,  indeed,  we  could  do  by  ourselves.  We  re- 
turned to  take  tea  with  his  wife,  who  was  most  agreeable. 

So  we  got  a  glimpse  of  that  life  at  Hampton  Court 
which  Dickens  so  funnily  hits  off  in  Our  Mutual  Friend 
as  the  home  of  Edgar's  mother,  and  Mr.  Beresford  told 
us  of  the  former  days  when  the  debtors  could  only  come 
out  on  Sunday,  and  so  on.  Sir  John  Bowring  took  us  to 
the  clubs,  to  the  British  Museum,  and  to  the  National 
Gallery,  where  we  found  his  wife  and  daughter  copying 
pictures ;  and  I  learned  then  twice  as  much  of  these  two 
great  national  institutions  as  I  should  have  done  with  a 
less  instructed  cicerone. 

Indeed,  we  saw  much  of  that  now  far-off,  lesser  Lon- 
don, of  which  I  was  to  see  so  much  more  later  on,  and 
we  went  to  Marlborough  House  and  Lambeth  Palace, 


INTELLECTUAL    LONDON  151 

and  other  great  houses,  and  to  galleries  galore,  until  we 
had  not  a  foot  to  stand  upon  from  fatigue.  Then  Ave 
journeyed  up  to  York  Minster,  and  to  Edinburgh,  and  to 
Blair  Athole,  and  to  the  "  Queen's  Yiew,"  and  down  by 
the  English  lakes ;  then  back  to  London  for  some  late 
balls  and  dinners,  and  some  invitations  to  country-houses 
within  a  few  hours  of  London. 

In  this  my  first  visit  to  London  I  was  struck  with  the 
intellectual  tone  of  certain  houses.  Men  of  distinction, 
artists,  and  authors  were  invited  everywhere  and  made 
much  of.  Literary  and  intellectual  questions  came  into 
the  gayest  salons.  Those  agreeable  men,  the  English 
clergy,  seemed  omnipresent,  and  London  was  a  metrop- 
olis of  science,  letters,  and  the  fine  arts.  Having  been 
introduced  by  Mr.  Motley,  it  was  possible  that  we  saw 
more  that  was  polished  and  intellectual  than  we  should 
have  done  otherwise ;  but  we  were  struck,  among  the 
older  men,  not  only  with  that  polish  of  an  hereditary 
aristocracy,  but  with  the  respect  with  which  they  treated 
men  of  genius — those  eminent  old  men — like  the  Duke 
of  Abercorn,  whom  some  one  called  "the  last  of  the 
grand  seigniors,"  being  conspicuously  elegant  and  court- 
eous. They  were  pre-eminently  well-mannered.  Lord 
Houghton  was  so  very  individual  a  man  that  it  was 
impossible  to  call  him  a  typical  Englishman.  He  liked 
to  gather  oddities  and  geniuses  around  his  table,  and  he 
was  always  particularly  friendly  to  Americans.  We 
came  in  at  the  end  of  war.  The  North  had  been 
victorious ;  we  Northerners  were  the  fashion ;  but  one 
lady  confided  to  me  that  she  thought  it  strange  that 
our  President,  Mr.  Eeverdy  Johnson,  should  come  over 
as  minister !  She  could  not  separate  Eeverdy  from  An- 
drew Johnson.     They  really  knew  very  little  about  us. 

Mr.  Motley,  aristocrat  by  birth,  association,  education, 


153  AN   EPISTLE   TO   POSTERITY 

and  manners,  was  still  too  much  of  a  patriot  to  allow 
any  disrespect  to  the  republic  which  he  represented; 
but  his  intelligence  was  too  broad  not  to  distinguish 
between  what  was  pure  and  simple  ignorance  of  our 
affairs  and  what  was  intended  for  impertinence.  His 
fine  lips  would  curl  a  little,  perhaps,  at  any  mistake  too 
palpable ;  but  he  was,  like  our  minister,  Charles  Francis 
Adams,  able  to  keep  his  indignation  in  check. 

London  society  was  far  more  exclusive  then  than  it  is 
now ;  it  was  smaller,  and  the  age  had  not  "  ripened  like 
a  plum."  I  was  also  struck  by  the  reserve  of  certain 
coteries :  they  kept  back  the  intellectual  treasures  of 
their  minds ;  they  even  regarded  a  quick  wit  and  a  lively 
tongue  as  a  little  fatiguing.  Wit  was  a  gymnast  whom 
they  distrusted,  reminding  one  of  Marie  Antoinette's  re- 
mark about  Moliere : 

"  Ce  Moliere  est  de  mauvais  gout,"  said  the  queen. 

"  Yous  vous  trompez,  madame,"  said  the  king ;  "  on 
pent  reprocher  a  Moliere  d'etre  quelquefois  de  mauvais 
ton^  mais  il  n^est  jamais  de  mauvais  gouV* 

Lord  Houghton  did  not  think  it  bad  manners  or  bad 
taste  to  be  witty,  but  many  of  his  countrymen  differed 
with  him  and  said  as  much.  Again,  I  think  the  English 
are  very  fond  of  being  entertained,  and  that  they  regard 
the  French  and  the  American  people  as  destined  by 
Heaven  to  amuse  them.  Between  the  two  there  are 
always  those  cosmopolitan  English  who  understand 
both  and  interpret  both.  Such  men  as  Mr.  Motley,  Mr. 
Lowell,  Mr.  Henry  James,  on  our  side ;  such  men  as  Lord 
Houghton,  Sir  Stafford  Northcote,  Earl  de  Grey,  Tom 
Hughes,  and  Kingsley,  on  their  side,  were  capable  of 
understanding  both.  I  think  Dean  Stanley,  kind  and 
lovely  though  he  was,  never  understood  or  thoroughly 
liked  Americans;  we  were  strange  beasts  to  him.    I  had 


VISITS   IN   LONDON  153 

the  pleasure  of  seeing  him  later  on  at  Mr.  Cyrus  W. 
Field's,  and  I  think  the  only  hour  he  thoroughly  enjoyed 
was  when  he  was  going  to  see  the  monument  to  Major 

Andre. 

* 

These  differences  of  temperament  are  utterly  beyond 
our  control.  Tennyson  and  Carlyle  could  never  endure 
Americans,  nor  do  I  believe  Disraeli  was  much  more 
tolerant,  although  always  most  polished.  But  there  were 
hearty  friends  of  ours  in  London,  enough  to  make  a  visit 
there  most  enjoyable ;  not  only  ^uch  splendid  examples 
as  Sir  William  Stirling-Maxwell,  but  innumerable  others ; 
and  of  women,  I  found  in  the  beautiful  Duchess  of  West- 
minster (sister  to  Lord  Konald  Gower),  in  Miss  Thack- 
eray, and  in  Lady  Yerney,  three  types  which  will  always 
stand  for  the  most  cordial  and  the  most  kindly  of  friends. 

Of  literary  ladies  I  was  not  so  fortunate  as  to  see 
many.  The  Hon.  Mrs.  Norton  and  Miss  Thackeray 
were  the  only  ones  whom  I  knew  well.  Lady  Yerney 
told  me  that  the  literary  society  of  London  was  too 
busy  to  go  out  much,  and  I  fancy  this  was  the  truth. 

George  Eliot  had  published  the  Spanish  Gypsy  the 
year  before,  and  I  was  determined  to  see  her,  but  the 
opportunity  never  occurred.  Mr.  Bancroft  had  given 
me  a  letter  to  Carlyle,  and  we  diligently  drove  to  Cheyne 
Walk ;  but  the  sage  was  out  walking.  I  think  he  always 
was,  when  Americans  called. 

But  these  our  failures  were  far  more  infrequent  than 
our  successes.  We  saw  all  the  fashionable  people  that 
we  wished  to  see,  and  received  that  social  welcome  which 
warms  the  heart.  And  one  knows  a  country  better  in 
thus  entering  its  homes,  its  strongholds,  than  by  merely 
bowing  to  a  celebrity. 

Our  little  experience  of  a  two  months'  visit  has  filled 
my  whole  life*with  a  joyous  remembrance  of  England ; 


154  AN    EPISTLE   TO    POSTEKITY 

it  made  me  many  friends,  and  led  to  a  correspondence 
with  Lord  Houghton  which  has  been  of  priceless  advan- 
tage. The  experience  has  been  oft  repeated,  and  I  have 
spent  many  seasons  in  London  since,  knowing  well  her 
artists  and  litterateurs,  her  hospitable  nobility,  and  have 
even  a  slight  acquaintance  with  her  admirable  Eoyal 
family. 

In  later  days  General  Badeau  presented  me  Avith  his 
Life  of  Grant  I  I  have  it,  with  his  autograph.  It  is  a 
noble  book,  and  does  both  honor.  Later  on,  with  all  his 
friends,  I  felt  very  much  astonished  at,  and  terribly  dis- 
appointed by,  the  attack  which  he  made  on  his  dj^ing 
chief.  No  one  could  mistake  Badeau's  style,  nor  that 
of  General  Grant ;  therefore  his  assumption,  if  he  ever 
made  it,  that  he  was  the  author  of  that  last  wonderful 
book,  which  the  dying  hero  wrote  with  death  clutching 
him  by  the  throat,  made  me  feel,  as  it  did  many,  that 
Badeau  was  profoundly  ungrateful.  He  is  gone  now, 
and  I  desire  to  lay  this  flower  on  his  grave :  he  was  a 
man  of  talent,  filled  with  good  impulses,  when  I  knew 
him ;  what  he  became  afterwards  I  do  not  know.  I  did 
not  see  him  for  ten  years  before  his  death,  but  read  his 
occasional  papers  with  great  pleasure. 

JSTobody  in  England  had  a  better  chance  to  see  and 
observe  the  different  phases  of  such  characters  as  Lord 
Houghton  than  had  Badeau,  and  he  knew  well  the  noble 
ladies  about  whom  he  wrote  so  admirably  The  lady  of 
Strawberry  Hill  had  never  so  good  a  portrait  painted 
of  her.  Countess  Waldegrave,  who  had  risen  from  the 
lowly  position  of  the  daughter  of  Braham,  the  singer,  to 
being  one  of  the  first  women  in  English  society  —  a 
woman  as  famous  in  her  day  as  Lady  Cassell  Holland 
was  in  hers  —  rendered  herself  completely  up  to  Ba- 
deau's pencil ;  and  the  sketches  of  the  Queen,  the  visit 


LADY    VERNEY''s   ACCOUNT   OF   LADY    BYEON  155 

of  General  Grant  to  the  Prince  of  Wales,  all  of  which  he 
witnessed,  have  become  historical  through  his  facile  pen. 

Lady  Yerney  confided  to  General  Badeau,  as  she  did  to 
me  at  her  own  house,  her  displeasure  at  the  revelations 
of  Mrs.  Stowe  in  regard  to  Lord  and  Lady  Byron.  She 
was  the  most  intimate  friend  of  Lady  Byron,  and  told 
me  that  she  had  from  Lady  Byron's  own  hps  the  follow- 
ing account  of  the  cause  of  the  separation  : 

Lady  Byron  found  in  one  of  his  old  desks  a  certificate 
of  the  marriage  with  the  Spanish  beauty  of  whom  Moore 
speaks.  Horrified  beyond  endurance  at  this  terrible  dis- 
closure, by  which  she  felt  herself  not  a  lawful  wife,  she 
Avent  to  Sir  Samuel  Komilly  and  to  Dr.  Lushington  and 
asked  their  advice.  They  both  said  to  her,  "  Stay  in 
Byron's  house  until  your  child  is  born,  and  then  leave 
him  and  await  developments."  She  followed  their  ad- 
vice implicitly.  So  much  was  she  in  love  with  Byron 
that  she  took  up  his  little  dog  and  kissed  it  as  she  left 
the  ill-fated  house  where  she  had  been  so  badly  treated. 

The  grave  question  of  the  legitimacy  of  Ada  prevented 
her  from  speaking  of  this  discovery,  but  she  never  lived 
with  Byron  after  it.  The  Spanish  beauty  never  troubled 
her,  so  perhaps  it  was  only  a  mock-marriage.  As  for 
the  terrible  aspersions  on  Byron's  sister  (Lady  or  Mrs. 
Augusta  Leigh),  Lady  Yerney  declared  them  to  have 
been  scandalous  lies.  She  thought  Lady  Byron  could 
never  have  uttered  them,  as  the  sister  of  Byron  was  her 
friend  through  life.  The  only  explanation  which  friends 
of  Lady  Byron  could  give  me  as  to  this  discrepancy  was 
that  Lady  Byron  was  not  at  all  times  perfectly  sane ; 
but  Lady  Yerney  believed  differently,  and  was  not  at  all 
sparing  in  her  criticisms  of  Mrs.  Stowe. 

We  came  home  in  November,  to  begin  again  that  home 
life  which  was  not  to  be  disturbed  for  many  years ;  but 


156  AN   EPISTLE   TO   POSTERITY 

the  education  and  delight  of  this  first  visit  were  not  to 
be  measured  by  words. 

There  are  three  things  which  astonish  an  American 
beyond  the  power  of  expression  on  a  first  visit  to  Europe. 
One  is  a  mountain,  the  second  is  a  cathedral,  the  third  is 
an  old  Italian  villa,  or  a  French  chateau,  or  an  Englisii 
great  house  peopled  by  three  hundred  years  of  cultivated 
and  continuous  ownership. 

What  a  superb  thing  it  is,  that  great  house,  with  its 
terraces  and  fountains,  its  statues  and  groups  of  marble 
and  bronze,  its  noble  facade,  its  stately  flights  of  steps, 
its  gardens,  a  la  Dufresnoy,  at  once  grand  and  poeti- 
cally wild ;  JS'ature  claiming  all  in  her  charming  caprices 
and  fairy  fantasies,  Art  standing  back  to  look  on  and  to 
admire !  Shall  we  ever  achieve  that  %  No,  not  until  we 
have  had  a  past  in  which  monarchs  can  squander  millions. 
To  cause  a  turf  to  become  velvet  we  must  first  have  a 
race  of  nobles  and  a  dynasty  of  artists.  Millionaires 
may  paint  their  beautiful  ceilings  and  hang  the  tapes- 
tries of  Flemish  looms  on  their  walls,  yet  the  most  deli- 
cate intelligence,  the  most  perfect  taste,  cannot  give  that 
last  touch  which  Time  so  unconsciously  adds ;  and  with- 
out that  touch  how  can  we  expect  to  build  a  cathedral 
like  Milan,  Cologne,  Canterbury,  York,  Ely,  Lincoln,  or 
Seville,  Toledo,  Strasburg,  Notre  Dame,  Chartres,  Eouen  ? 

And  again,  although  since  then  our  Western  railroads 
have  thrown  open  to  us  the  fine  snow-peaks  of  the  Eock- 
ies,  we  can  never  have  the  surprise  of  the  Swiss  snow- 
mountains  (which  are  next  door  to  the  palace  and  the  ca- 
thedral) ;  our  scenery,  majestic  as  it  is,  wants  tradition 
and  the  marks  of  man's  handiwork  to  give  it  perspective. 

When  we  reached  Paris,  on  our  way  home,  it  was  No- 
vember, and  I  had  a  cold,  so  that  my  first  raptures  were 
somewhat  chilled. 


CHAPTER  X 

A  Little  Journey  in  the  Land  of  William  Tell — Basle  and  Lucerne — 
On  the  Way  to  Interlaken — The  Jungfrau  and  the  Giesbach — 
Byron  and  Voltaire — Geneva  and  Mont  Blanc — An  Ascent  of  the 
Brevent  —  Over  the  Simplon  Road  ^nd  through  the  Gorge  of 
Gondo — On  the  Italian  Slope. 

My  trip  through  Switzerland  must  ever  remain  a 
pleasant  memory  of  my  first  visit  to  the  Continent  in 
1869. 

Basle  is  a  picturesque  old  town,  with  its  ten-storied 
houses — almost  as  quaint,  some  of  them,  as  those  of 
Nuremberg— crowding  down  to  the  rushing  and  over- 
flowing Rhine  Eiver,  which  here  is  more  tumultuous 
than  anywhere  else  we  have  seen  it.  That  troublesome 
water-spirit.  Undine's  uncle,  Kuhleborn,  who  was  so  in- 
convenient alike  to  his  friends  and  his  foes,  and  who 
had  to  be  held  down  by  very  heavy  masonry  even  in 
the  courtyard  of  his  niece,  has  taken  up  his  abode  in 
the  Rhine,  beneath  the  walls  of  Basle ;  and  it  is  an  ever- 
recurring  wonder  to  careful  and  anxious  mothers  why 
the  Basle  children  are  not  all  drowned.  It  is  evident 
that  if  they  once  got  within  the  grasp  of  the  water- 
spirit  they  would  never  escape,  for  he  lashes  the  green 
glacier  tide  into  a  superb  furj^  here,  and  the  Rhine  is  no- 
w^here  more  impressive  than  at  Basle. 

The  Miinster  is  a  delightful  nut  for  the  antiquarian 
gourmand.  It  has  two  lofty  towers,  is  Gothic  and 
quaint,  and  religions  in  its  sombreness,  with  those  em- 


158  AN   EPISTLE   TO    POSTEKITY 

blematical  bas-reliefs  and  statues  and  carvings  of  which 
the  old  workers  in  stone  w^ere  so  fond.  Here  we  have 
John  the  Baptists  and  saints,  our  Saviour  and  the  angels 
at  the  dreadful  day  of  judgment,  and  an  allegorical  re- 
lief of  the  "  Works  of  Charity,"  very  beautiful,  with 
women's  and  children's  faces.  Then  we  have  over  the 
doorway  the  significant  parable  of  the  wise  and  foolish 
virgins,  all  the  foolish  virgins  handsome  and  all  the  wise 
ones  plain.  The  west  front  illustrates  the  fourteenth 
century.  There  the  Virgin  and  Child  are  represented, 
St.  George  and  the  dragon,  and  the  benefactors  of  the 
church,  the  Emperor  Henry  and  his  Empress. 

This  church  was  excommunicated  by  Pope  Eugenius 
lY. ;  it  was  one  of  the  first  to  bathe  in  the  advancing 
wave  of  the  Eeformation,  and  is  said  to  be  the  "  finest 
Protestant  church  in  existence."  It  dates  back  to  1010, 
which  is  a  long  time  ago.  Many  vicissitudes  have 
passed  over  it.  It  has  been  partly  destroyed  by  fire, 
and  rebuilt.  It  of  course  suffered  in  the  iconoclasm  of 
the  sixteenth  century,  but  it  has  been  so  judiciously  re- 
stored that  not  a  particle  of  its  charm  is  gone ;  the  re- 
storer has  borrowed  the  tooth  of  time,  and  has  used  it 
with  his  other  tools.  How  immensely  old  are  those  re- 
liefs of  the  eleventh  century,  and  the  old  episcopal  chair ! 
The  pulpit  and  font  are  considered  modern,  as  they  only 
date  to  1424.  There  are  monuments  to  the  wafe  and 
mother  of  Eudolph  of  Hapsburg,  who  seems  himself  in 
the  twilight  of  history. 

It  has  a  charm  for  the  student,  for  here  is  the  tomb 
of  Erasmus  of  Rotterdam,  the  gentler  genius  of  the 
Reformation,  and  the  learned,  delightful  scholar. 

In  its  old,  dusty  council-hall  are  the  famed  frescoes 
of  the  "Dance  of  Death,"  erroneously  attributed  to 
Holbein.     They  are  gloomy  and  fantastic,  like  the  age 


FROM   BASLE   TO   LUCERNE  169 

they  symbolize.  The  plague  has  left  this  dreadful  evi- 
dence of  itself  all  over  this  part  of  Europe.  Every- 
where you  see  a  ''  Dance  of  Death." 

The  artist  is,  after  all,  the  best  historian  of  his  time, 
and  in  whatever  he  is  wrought  upon  to  paint,  be  it 
"  Holy  Family,"  ''  The  King  Drinks,"  "  Beatrice  Cenci," 
"  Galileo  before  the  Council,"  or  the  grim  and  gloomy 
allegory  of  the  "  Dance  of  Death,"  he  paints  better  than 
he  knows,  and  gives  us  the  age  he  lived  in,  its  ruling  in- 
fluences, its  agitations,  and  its  crimes. 

From  Basle  to  Lucerne  is  a  short  railway  journey, 
but  rich  in  experiences,  for  you  see  first  that  long  line 
of  snow-clad  Alps.  It  is  an  enormous  lift  to  the  vision, 
as  you  gaze  on  that  rosy  summit : 

"  The  last  to  parley  with  the  setting  sun." 

We  arrived  at  the  Schweizerhof,  one  of  the  best  hotels 
of  Europe,  in  time  for  a  glorious  sunset  over  the-  Lake 
of  Lucerne.  Its  royal  guards,  Pilatus  (named  for  the 
Governor  of  Judea,  who  is  supposed  to  have  wandered 
hither,  pursued  by  a  guilty  conscience,  and  to  have  per- 
ished miserably  on  the  cloudy  heights)  and  Rhigi,  were 
clad  in  purple  for  the  occasion,  and  it  was  a  kingly  sight. 

There  arose  beyond  the  lake  those  White  Peaks,  lovely 
nymphs  who  entice  you  onward  to  their  frozen  bowers. 
Who  can  describe  them,  who  can  resist  their  weird, 
unusual  charm  ?  I  do  not  wonder  at  the  power  of  the 
Siren  of  the  Alps,  nor  at  the  numbers  of  her  victims. 

Lucerne  is  the  chief  town  of  the  canton,  and  situated 
as  never  town  was,  with  the  lake  in  front  and  the  moun- 
tains on  three  sides.  The  "  Lake  of  the  Four  Forest 
Cantons,"  this  lovely  Lake  of  Lucerne,  is  probably  the 
most  beautiful  in  the  world.  It  is  of  that  peculiar  and 
indescribable  blue — 


160  AN   EPISTLE   TO    POSTEEITY 

"The  light  that  never  was  on  sea  or  land, 
The  consecration  and  the  poet's  dream." 

And  the  whole  scene  brings  back  to  you  the  apology  of 
the  Swiss  print-seller  who  explained  the  predominance 
of  that  color  in  his  pictures  by  the  American  demand 
for  it : 

"  II  faut  toujours,  monsieur,  beaucoup  de  bleu  pour  les 
Americains." 

He  thought,  good  man,  that  as  the  Americans  paid 
most  money  for  everything  they  should  have  their 
money's  worth;  and  he  did  not  know,  perhaps,  that 
they,  of  all  travellers,  are  most  struck  by  this  peculiar 
blue,  so  different  is  it  from  the  tints  of  our  own  lakes. 

This  lake  touches  the  four  historical  cantons  of  Uri, 
Schwytz,  Unterwalden,  and  Lucerne.  Here  is  the  land 
of  William  Tell,  and  Schiller's  poem  is  your  best  guide 
round  the  lake.  If  William  Tell  is  a  "  myth,"  as  the  icon- 
oclasts of  history  pretend,  he  is  a  myth  who  "  preached 
the  eternal  creed  of  liberty,"  and  I  believe  in  him,  and 
listen  always  with  much  emotion  to  the  story  of  the 
apple.  His  statue  at  Altorf,  the  frescoes  representing 
his  celebrated  feat  with  the  bow,  and  all  relating  to  him 
are  genuine  enough  for  me ;  and  Schiller  has  made  him 
true,  if  he  were  not.  I  grant  that  the  three  friends  of 
Tell  —  Stauffacher,  Melchthal,  and  Fiirst  —  as  you  see 
their  three  figures  in  fresco,  and  particularly  as  they  are 
presented  in  the  opera,  are  apt  to  be  bores.  Patriotism, 
like  all  other  virtues,  is  interesting  only  so  long  as  it  is 
not  run  into  the  ground. 

But  how  lovely  is  that  virtue  when  you  see  it  imaged 
by  Thorwaldsen's  lion — the  noble  old  monarch,  with  his 
wounded  paws  stretched  over  the  lilies  of  France ! 

As  I  looked  at  this  sculpture  there  came  a  trick  of 
sunlight  for  which  I  felt  infinitely  obliged.     It  was  a 


RHIGI   AND   MOUNT   PILATUS  161 

gloomy  day,  and  we  could  scarcely  see  the  lion,  overhung 
as  it  is  by  the  rock,  and  the  shadow  of  the  trees  is  heavy 
about  it  always.  But  as  we  were  trying  to  spell  out  the 
inscription  the  clouds  parted,  and  one  last  tribute  of  the 
dying  day  rested  on  the  dying  lion.  We  saw  him  at  his 
best. 

"So  shines  a  good  deed  in  a  naughtyworld." 

Here,  again,  the  artist  has  proved  himself  the  best  his- 
torian, and  no  one  has  written  the  story  of  the  Swiss 
Guard  as  has  Thorwaldsen. 

The  ascent  of  the  Khigi  and  of  Mount  Pilatus  afford 
work  for  two  days  each,  and  draw  to  Lucerne  the  great- 
est number  of  tourists.  Here  conversation  is  wholly  of 
the  picturesque.  Your  next  neighbor  on  the  right  has 
been  in  the  clouds  all  day.  Your  neighbor  on  the  left 
has  been  up  the  lake,  and  can  talk  of  nothing  but  the 
Blumenalp  and  the  Bergenstock,  or  the  vision  he  has 
had  of  the  Bernese  Alps ;  or  your  artist  friend  comes  in 
with  a  sketch  made  just  above  Tell's  chapel. 

Here  we  met  Mozier,  the  American  sculptor,  who 
passed  his  summers  frequently  at  Lucerne.  Nothing 
could  exceed  his  enthusiasm  for  this  delicious  spot,  and 
he  bade  it  adieu  with  regret,  having  engaged  to  meet 
some  friends  at  Lake  Como.  As  we  said  farewell  to  this 
refined  and  delightful  person  we  little  thought  it  was  for 
the  last  time,  but  in  less  than  a  year  we  heard  of  his 
lamented  death.  Here  we  met  our  American  artist  Mi- 
gnot.  He  was  full  of  work,  full  of  hope,  and  sketching 
the  mountain  effects  with  great  enthusiasm.  He  has 
gone  in  his  early  middle  age,  and  works  no  more. 

Here  we  saw  the  King  and  Queen  of  Belgium,  wear- 
ing on  their  faces  the  imprint  of  their  great  sorrow — the 

loss  of  their  only  .son. 
11 


162  AN   EPISTLE   TO    POSTERITY 

Here  we  met,  I  should  say,  twenty-five  hundred  of  our 
own  countrymen,  more  or  less,  all  spending  money  with 
great  energy,  and  being  reprehended  for  so  doing  by  the 
travellers  of  all  other  nations  as  price-raisers.  If  the 
Americans  would  look  at  their  bills  and  condescend  to 
be  economical,  as  the  English  are,  it  would  be  in  quite 
as  good  taste ;  but  the  trouble  with  some  travellers  is 
that  they  have  not  had  money  a  great  while,  and  any 
new  sensation  is  apt  to  be  uncontrollable. 

Lucerne  is  a  pretty  Swiss  town,  with  eleven  thousand 
souls,  mostly  Catholics.  We  saw  a  great  demonstra- 
tion, ten  thousand  strong,  of  the  "  men  of  Uri "  and  the 
other  cantons,  who  went  about  singing  their  national 
songs.  Had  they  retained  their  costumes  how  interest- 
ing it  would  have  been  !  but  they  wore  the  disenchant- 
ing clothes  of  the  nineteenth  century,  and  were  simply 
short  and  ugly  men  with  spectacles.  But  Lucerne  has 
an  unrivalled  organ.  You  are  allowed  to  go  and  hear 
it  at  twilight,  and  as  you  gather,  wanderers  of  all  na- 
tions, in  the  dimly  lighted  church  you  are  in  the  mood 
for  music — 

"  As  o'er  the  kej's  the  musing  organist, 
Beginning  fitfully  and  far  away, 
First  lets  his  fingers  wander  as  they  list, 
To  build  a  bridge  from  dreamland  for  his  lay." 

Then  come  wondrous  chords,  great  harmonies,  clashing 
weapons;  then  you  seem  to  hear  monks  chanting  their 
evening  hymn ;  then  a  single  voice — almost  a  voice  from 
heaven,  so  pure,  so  exalted,  so  sadly  sweet ;  again  it  be- 
comes human,  freighted  with  human  sorrows,  human 
tears.  It  soars  upward  in  the  Ave  Ilaria.  Then  rises 
a  chorus  of  voices  chanting  the  hymn  of  peace  or  a  re- 
quiem for  the  dead;  now  the  shrill  voices  of  the  nuns; 


THE    ORGAN    AT    LUCERNE  163 

and  above  all  floats  the  serene  beauty  of  the  boy  choir — 
that  faltering,  vibrating  soprano  which  is  of  all  musical 
sounds  the  most  touching,  the  most  profoundly  affecting 
to  the  human  heart.  As  tears  begin  to  trickle  down 
cheeks  all  unused  to  such  visitants,  the  melody  changes 
and  a  woman's  voice  sings  tranquilly  some  Italian  air. 
Again  your  senses  cheat  you,  and  a  pattering  rain  beats 
upon  the  roof ;  the  thunder  rattles  and  you  look  anx- 
iously at  your  thin  coat.  However,  the  innocuous  storm 
bursts  over  your  head  and  vanishes  in  the  chords  of 
the  Russian  national  hymn,  the  American  anthem  of 
Yankee  Doodle  (somewhat  apotheosized),  or  God  Save 
the  Queen,  for  the  cunning  organist  knows  to  whom 
he  is  playing;  and  after  a  few  more  glorious  notes 
the  music  dies  away,  and  you  fold  your  tents  like  the 
Arabs  and  go  back  to  your  hotel. 

I  can  believe  anything  of  the  tricks  of  sound  since  I 
heard  that  organ ;  and  afterwards  we  timed  our  daily 
journeys  so  that  we  might  arrive  in  the  towns  famous 
for  organs  at  the  hour  of  twilight  and  hear  them  play. 
But  w^e  never  heard  anything  so  fine  again.  Perhaps 
we  were  under  the  spell  of  that  rosy  first  love  of  travel, 
whose  fruits  are  so  delicious;  perhaps  (and  this  is  prob- 
able) the  organist  was  a  man  of  genius. 

From  Lucerne  we  drove  to  Interlaken  over  the  Brii- 
nig  Pass.  This  road,  after  leaving  the  Lake  of  Lucerne, 
became  very  disagreeable  from  the  dust,  and  very  sad 
from  the  effects  of  the  inundations ;  villages  half  gone, 
and  that  dreadful  devastation  of  sand  and  gravel  cover- 
ing the  once  smiling  fields  which  is  so  hopeless  and  dis- 
heartening. 

Yet  the  latter  part  of  this  drive  is  very  picturesque, 
and  the  twihght  finds  you  wishing  for  "more  light," 
that  you  may  see^  Interlaken  and  its  w^alnut  avenues. 


164  AN   EPISTLE   TO    POSTERITY 

But  in  our  case  the  approach  to  that  pretty  and  con- 
venient town,  with  its  Kursaal,  music-shops,  Americans, 
English,  and  its  innumerable  excursions,  was  veiled  by 
night. 

It  is  delightfully  comfortable,  this  town  "between 
the  lakes,"  Brienz  and  Thun.  The  hotels,  particularly  the 
Victoria  and  Hotel  Jungfrau,  are  good  even  for  Swit- 
zerland, famous  for  good  hotels. 

Here  you  have  the  excursions  to  the  Wengern  Alp,  to 
Reichenbach,  to  Lauterbrunnen  (what  a  word !  "  noth- 
ing but  springs  "  is  its  beautiful  meaning),  and  there  you 
see  the  Staubbach.  Then  to  Grindelwald,  where  you  meet 
the  glacier,  a  most  distinguished  and  uncommon  ac- 
quaintance. And  there  —  oh  the  ineffectuality  of  lan- 
guage ! — there  you  see  the  glorious,  the  unrivalled  Jung- 
frau! When  I  begin  to  talk  of  the  Jungfrau  I  am 
convinced  that  language  was  given  to  us  to  conceal  our 
ideas.  Other  things  are  lofty,  are  grand,  are  lovely, 
and  are  beautiful;  but  the  Jungfrau  is  unlike  all  other 
things,  and  yet  she  is  all  these.  How  can  I  begin  to  de- 
scribe this  lovely  lady  of  the  Alpine  world  ?  How,  if  I 
begin,  can  I  stop  ?  How  can  I  tell  of  her  majesty,  her 
unsullied  snows,  her  noble  uplift  above  the  sordid  lower 
world  ?  They  say  those  dizzy  heights  have  been  scaled 
by  human  footsteps ;  they  can  never  be  reached  by  hu- 
man epithets.  She  is  serene  and  unassailable  in  beauty 
— the  Jungfrau — without  a  rival.  How  respectfully  the 
•other  mountains  stand  away,  like  courtiers  round  a 
queen !  and  how  her  green  velvet  hills  crouch  at  either 
side  like  footstools  for  her  royal  feet !  Perfect  in  out- 
line, sublime  in  height,  fortunate  in  position,  dazzling  in 
purity,  the  Jungfrau  is  one  of  the  dearest  delights  of 
Switzerland. 

You  get  so  fond  of  her  that  you  like  to  toy  with  your 


MOUNTAIN   CLIMBING  165 

liking,  and  go  away  and  turn  your  back  upon  her,  that 
you  may  have  the  pleasure  of  seeing  her  again  with 
surprised  vision.  You  try  to  forget  how  beautiful  she 
is,  that  3^ou  may  enjoy  the  charm  over.  You  come 
again  and  again,  like  any  fond,  foolish  lover,  and  wor- 
ship her  anew. 

Perhaps  because  the  Jungfrau  is  surrounded  (as  you 
see  her  from  Interlaken)  by  green  mountains,  her  snows 
obtain  that  intensity  of  whiteness  which  makes  her  con- 
spicuous even  in  the  land  of  snow.  One  would  think 
all  snow  must  be  equally  white,  but  the  Jungfrau  makes 
all  other  snow  look  gray ;  and  her  peak,  "  the  Silber- 
horn,"  is  almost  blinding  in  its  dazzling  brightness. 

If  one  has  time  and  strength,  one  should  go  over  all 
the  passes  and  make  all  the  excursions.  But,  alas !  who 
has  time  or  strength  in  these  degenerate  days?  They 
are  both  things  of  the  past,  and  went  out  with  our  heroic 
ancestors.  That  blessed  invention  the  chaise  d  por- 
teurs — blessed  for  the  lame  and  the  lazy — will  take  you, 
sans  fatigue,  sans  danger,  sans  everything,  wherever  a 
mule  can  go  and  wherever  you  want  to  go.  I  saw  an 
Englishman  who  must  have  weighed  three  hundred 
pounds  being  comfortably  transported  over  the  high 
Alps  in  one  of  these  chairs,  and  he  was  so  generous 
with  his  pourboire  that  his  bearers  uttered  blessings  on 
him  as  they  wiped  their  streaming  foreheads  and  wished 
inconsistently  that  there  were  more  like  him.  A  Swiss 
will  carry  you  anywhere,  or  do  anything  for  you,  for 
five  francs.  But  the  carriage  routes  and  the  piazzas  of 
the  hotels  will  give  you  views  enough  to  last  you  a  life- 
time, if  you  have  not  time  or  strength  for  more.  The 
most  delicate  invalid  could  make  the  tour  of  Switzerland. 

At  Grindelwald  you  see  the  glacier,  of  all  things  most 
indescribable.    The  sea  frozen  in  a  storm  is  the  image 


166  •  AN    EPISTLE   TO    POSTERITY 

which  most  nearly  describes  it  to  me.  Whether  you  look 
up  at  its  awful  solitudes  or  down  where  it  rests  its  icy 
tongue  on  the  valley,  with  the  pink  crocus  blossoming  on 
the  very  edge ;  whether  you  examine  its  blue  and  broken 
ice  or  draw  away  from  its  fearful  crevasse,  or  think  of 
its  cold,  defined,  steady,  and  silent  course,  with  the  im- 
mense boulders  on  its  bosom — wherever  and  whenever 
you  see  it,  it  is  the  miracle  of  nature,  the  wonder  of  the 
Alpine  world. 

At  Lauterbrunnen  you  have  the  Staubbach,  so  famous 
from  Lord  Byron's  comparison  to  the  tail  of  the  white 
horse  of  the  Apocalypse.  It  is  not  so  grand  as  that,  but 
a  graceful,  evanescent  thing — a  veil  floating  in  the  winds, 
a  vapor,  a  vision,  a  "silver  dust  of  water."  You  see  a 
dozen  such  on  your  way  to  Eeichenbach,  which  itself  is 
a  gloriously  abundant,  wild,  American  sort  of  fall. 

But  the  prettiest  of  all  the  excursions  from  Interlaken 
is  the  Giessbach  Fall.  You  go  up  the  Lake  of  Brienz  to 
Giessbach,  and  must  then  ascend  a  very  precipitous  hill. 
You  find  a  hotel  in  a  forest,  but  embowered  with  flowers, 
and  near  to  the  famous  waterfall.  So  isolated  is  the 
whole  thing  that  you  and  your  fellow-travellers  are  like 
a  family,  one  which  could  easily  draw  round  the  fire, 
and  each  tell  his  story. 

At  evening  they  illuminate  the  fall  with  colored  lights. 
The  guide-books  denounce  this  as  tricky  and  unnatural, 
and  as  a  cou;p  de  theatre;  but  I  did  not  think  so.  It  was 
playing  with  nature,  but  she  can  afford  it  in  these  her 
wild  and  sportive  moods. 

All  about  these  charming  spots  you  meet  the  Swiss 
beggar  in  his  most  protean  forms.  He  is  very  anxious 
you  should  buy  a  marmot — why,  I  could  not  discover, 
as  the  animal  is  simply  an  enlarged  rat,  and  not  at  all 
rare. 


FEEYBUEG,  LAUSANNE,  GENEVA  167 

The  inexorable  necessities  of  travel  force  you  onward, 
and  after  a  pleasant  sail  on  the  Lake  of  Thun  and  a  short 
railway  journey  you  are  at  Freyburg  in  time  to  hear  the 
organ. 

Freyburg  is  a  romantic  town  hung  in  mid-air.  It  is 
built  on  several  precipices,  and  the  business  of  life  goes 
on  by  means  of  two  suspension-bridges,  each  longer  than 
our  famous  one  at  Niagara.  In  your  hotel  you  are  hung 
up  as  if  in  a  bird-cage,  and  realize  the  life  of  a  pet  canary. 
What  is  the  reason  for  Freyburg  ?  Why  was  such  an 
impossible  town  built  ?  It  has  drives  of  unusual  beauty, 
an  old  tower  of  extraordinary  interest,  any  amount  of 
antiquity,  and  great  apparent  comfort  and  prosperity; 
in  fact,  the  world  has  not  sufficiently  emphasized  Frey- 
burg as  one  of  its  attractive  spots. 

Go  hence  to  Lausanne,  and  stay  as  long  as  you  can  at 
the  "  Beau  Kivage,"  a  lordly  place.  Sail  up  to  Chillon, 
and  examine  that  lonely,  sad  prison.  Look  your  fill  at 
those  blue  mountains.  Eecall  your  "  !N"ouvelle  Ileloise," 
for  here  was  her  home. 

Stop,  if  you  can,  at  the  Hotel  Byron  and  at  Yevay. 
Go  down  the  lake  to  Geneva  and  see  Mont  Blanc  for  the 
first  time.  Old  Yoltaire  had  a  poor  opinion  of  Geneva. 
''  When  I  shake  my  wig,  I  powder  the  whole  republic,'* 
said  that  acidulated  wit.  They  thought  better  of  him. 
They  said  he  "  made  his  estate  pay,  his  tenants  prosper- 
ous, and  his  prospects  smile."  Few  better  things  were 
ever  said  of  any  man.  And  yet  how  few  people  read 
him  now,  and  how  little  the  great  genius  who  ruled  his 
own  age  has  affected,  or  will  affect,  any  other ! 

His  house  at  Ferney  is  interesting,  and  is  kept  scrupu- 
lously as  a  show-place.  The  long  "pleached -alley" 
drive  in  which  he  used  to  walk  is  still  shady  and  sweet, 
allowing  you  glimpses  of  the  distant  prospect,  a  "  ver- 


168  AN   EPISTLE   TO  POSTEEITT 

dant  cloister,"  through  which  can  be  seen  the  Alps  and 
Mont  Blanc ;  yet  no  one  loves  it  better  that  Voltaire 
has  walked  there. 

Far  different  feelings  associate  themselves  with  Cham- 
pagne Diodati.  Here  Milton  visited,  and  here  Byron 
lived  —  the  poet  whose  genius  has  added  a  charm  to 
nature's  loveliest  and  most  sublime  scenes.  You  feel 
your  indebtedness  to  Byron  nowhere  else  as  you  do  in 
Switzerland.  To  him  alone  has  it  been  given  to  find  a 
phraseology  noble  enough  for  the  Alps. 

"The  avalanche,  the  thunderbolt  of  snow'* 

is  one  of  these  fine  descriptive  lines. 

Lake  Leman  needs  no  other  description  after  his.  No 
artist  could  paint  it  in  calm  or  in  storm  as  he  has  done. 
With  what  undying  charm  has  he  invested  Chillonl 
"  Clarens,  sweet  Clarens,"  and  the  lofty  Jura,  who  "  an- 
swers from  her  misty  shroud."  How  perfectly  he  de- 
scribes the  "  glacier's  cold  and  restless  mass  " !  And  even 
the  guide-books  can  find  no  words  so  fitting  as  his  with 
which  to  describe  the  scenery,  climate,  the  most  noble  or 
the  most  common  phenomena  of  the  Alpine  world. 

Every  house  in  which  Byron  lived  has  become  a 
"  shrine  to  the  pilgrim  of  genius,"  and  it  is  with  loving 
pity  and  unbounded  admiration  for  the  splendid  gifts 
of  the  unhappy  poet  that  you  tread  the  classic  paths 
about  the  Champagne  Diodati.  Yet  with  all  this  newly 
awakened  gratitude  to  the  poet  in  our  hearts,  we  had 
the  exquisite  pain  of  reading,  at  this  very  time,  the 
terrible  attack  made  upon  him  by  a  countrywoman  of 
our  own.  The  poet  is  silent ;  he  cannot  answer  it,  but 
the  world  has  answered  it  for  him,  and  has  met  the  at- 
tack Avith  indignant  disbelief.  Byron  was  too  fond  of 
accusing  himself  to  have  been  a  very  guilty  man.    Men 


LAKE    LEMAN  169 

who  really  commit  crimes  are  not  fond  of  telling  of 
them.  The  morbid  and  the  highly  imaginative  often 
think  themselves  worse  than  they  are.  Perhaps  Heaven 
may  forgive  such  false  self-reckoning,  and  may  think 
it  a  lesser  crime  than  a  comfortable  self -righteous- 
ness. 

I  said  the  poet  was  silent.  Does  he  not  from  that 
far-off  sphere,  where  all  that  was  noble  of  him  exists, 
purified  from  the  frailties  and  passions  of  earth,  drop 
these  words  of  answer  and  reproof  upon  the  bosom  of 
the  lake  he  loved  ? — 

"Clear,  placid  Leman  !  thy  contrasted  lake, 
With  the  wild  world  I  dwelt  in,  is  a  thing 
Which  warns  with  its  stillness  to  forsake 
Earth's  troubled  waters  for  a  purer  spring. 
This  quiet  sail  is  as  a  noiseless  wing 
•  To  waft  me  from  destruction.     Once  I  loved 
Torn  ocean's  roar,  but  thy  soft  murmuring 
Sounds  sweet  as  if  a  sister's  voice  reproved, 
That  I  with  stern  delights  should  e'er  have  been  so  moved." 

So  long  as  the  lake  mirrors  the  mountains,  so  long 
as  the  Alps  rise  one  stone  above  another,  so  long  as  the 
human  heart  can  detect  what  is  true  and  what  is  false 
in  the  utterances  of  inspiration,  so  long  shall  these  lines 
be  read  and  quoted  and  admired  as  Lord  Byron's  un- 
answerable defence. 

"  Mon  lac  est  le  premier,"  says  Yoltaire ;  and  you  al- 
most forgive  Yoltaire  for  his  disagreeable  qualities  when 
you  remember  how  he  liked  this  beautiful  Lake  of  Ge- 
neva. It  is  hard  to  say  it  is  the  most  beautiful  when 
you  remember  Lucerne  and  the  Italian  lakes ;  but  when 
you  are  looking  at  it  you  cannot  say  that  anything  is 
more  beautiful.  Its  extraordinary  blue,  its  clearness, 
its  variety  of  scenerj^,  vine-clad  hills,  rocky  precipices, 


170  AN   EPISTLE   TO   POSTEEITY 

and  above  all,  in  every  sense,  Mont  Blanc,  make  it  a 
memorable  spot. 

Geneva  is  such  a  clean,  healthful,  agreeable  city,  with 
unrivalled  sites  for  villas  along  the  lake,  and  in  full  view 
of  Mont  Blanc,  that  you  are  not  astonished  to  find 
some  of  the  English  nobility,  like  Lady  Emily  Peel,  or 
Germans,  like  Baron  Hothschild  and  others — the  lux- 
urious of  all  nations — living  in  its  environs.  The  day 
we  were  permitted  to  see  the  splendid  villa  of  Baron 
Eothschild  was  a  day  clothed  in  all  the  glories  of  mid- 
summer, and  the  tints  of  lake,  intervale,  and  mountain 
were  in  their  perfection.  JSTothing  can  surpass  the  view 
from  this  princely  residence ;  nothing  can  surpass  the 
view  of  it,  for  it  is  one  of  those  perfected  combinations 
of  architecture,  landscape  gardening,  flowers,  fountains, 
statues,  vases,  and  vines,  of  which  we  have  no  examples 
in  this  country,  few  even  in  Europe.  The  villas  at  New- 
port more  nearly  approach  it  than  any  I  have  seen. 
And  they  cannot  have  the  view.  They  cannot  see 
Mont  Blanc  at  sunset,  with  attendant  Alps,  its  crown- 
ing stone  a  burning,  brilliant  ruby.  Nor  can  they  en- 
joy the  lake,  a  huge  sapphire,  blue  and  beautiful,  though 
they  do  have  an  undeniable  ocean. 

There  are  so  many  birds,  flowers,  animals  (for  he  has 
quite  a  little  zoological  garden)  at  the  Baron's  villa,  so 
many  trees,  walks,  solitudes,  and  arbors,  that  you  would 
be  tempted  to  call  it  a  wilderness  of  delights,  did  not 
any  allusion  to  wildness  seem  out  of  place.  It  is  like 
the  "  wilderness  "  in  Miss  Ferrier's  novel  of  Marriage, 
where  the  heroine  says  she  thinks  she  should  like  a 
wilderness  if  it  were  "  full  of  roses  and  good  society." 

"We  started  off  for  Chamouni  in  a  heavy  rain,  but  the 
weather-wise  told  us  it  was  not  impossible  that  we 
should  find  serene  weather  before  we  ^ot  there.     Their 


CHAMOUNI   AND   MER   DE   GLACE  171 

words  were  words  of  wisdom,  and  we  saw  Mont  Blanc 
peering  into  the  valley  just  beyond  Sallanches.  He 
seems  to  be  bending  a  crooked  nose  over  the  valley  at 
this  point,  but  at  every  turn  he  grows  higher,  whiter, 
more  sublime,  more  magnificent. 

"Above  me  are  the  Alps, 
The  palaces  of  nature,  whose  vast  walls 
Have  pinnacled  in  clouds  their  snowy  scalps, 
And  throned  Eternity  in  icy  halls 
Of  cold  sublimity," 

You  cannot  do  without  ^''our  Byron. 

The  road  to  Chamouni  is  perfectly  good.  You  drive 
to  the  very  foot  of  Mont  Blanc  with  the  greatest  ease. 
The  hotels  at  Chamouni  are  comfortable,  and  you  want 
five  days  there  of  good  weather  to  see  all  that  you  must 
see. 

For  there  is  Mer  de  Glace,  most  mighty  and  most 
wonderful;  you  approach  it  by  the  Montanvert,  up 
which  you  are  carried  by  mule  or  chaise  di  porteurs. 
You  get  views  of  the  Arve  below  you  and  the  Felgere 
and  Brevent  opposite ;  as  you  ascend  you  see  the  Aiguille 
de  Dru,  a  needle  of  granite,  rise  before  you.  You  can 
look  up  the  Mer  de  Glace  two  leagues,  and  see  beyond  it 
the  various  "  aiguilles,"  and  a  thousand  nameless  peaks, 
all  distanced  by  the  gigantic  Aiguille  Yerte,  which  is 
13,000  feet  above  the  level  of  the  sea.  ]N"o  language 
can  describe  the  silent  majesty  of  this  scene. 

Not  being  able  to  ascend  Mont  Blanc  (and,  strange  to 
say,  you  have  a  terrible  desire  to  do  so !),  we  did  the 
next  best  thing:  we  went  up  the  Brevent,  vis-d-vis  to» 
Mont  Blanc. 

We  had  a  glorious  day — not  a  cloud  in  the  blue  sky 
(it  was,  by-the-wa}^,  the  12th  of  September,  a  month 


172  AN   EPISTLE    TO    POSTEEITT 

often  blessed  by  good  weather,  our  guide  told  us) — and 
we  wound  up  easily  in  two  hours  to  Plauprat,  by  vari- 
ous conveyances,  mules,  chaises,  and  feet  being  put  into 
requisition.  We  finally  got  9000  feet  above  our  ordi- 
nary walk  in  life,  and  held  Mont  Blanc  in  the  hollow  of 
our  hands. 

Every  peak  and  every  glacier,  all  the  "  aiguilles,"  the 
pine  forests  below  and  the  eternal  snow  above — all  is 
visible  from  this  splendid  position;  you  are  two-fifths 
of  the  height  of  Mont  Blanc  above  the  valley,  and  see 
what  is  justly  called  the  "  whole  mass  of  Mont  Blanc." 

One  little  fleecy  cloud  rested  two  minutes  on  that 
rounded  summit  which  they  call  "Napoleon's  Hat" — 
and  indeed  it  reminds  one  of  a  chapeau-lras — and  then 
went  floating  up  into  the  blue,  retaining  the  shape  per- 
fectly, as  if  it  were  seeking  some  other  monarch  higher 
up  to  crown  with  its  unsubstantial  honors.  It  was  a 
pretty  phenomenon,  and  much  noticed  and  talked  of  by 
our  guides,  one  of  whom  had  scaled  that  dizzy  height 
sixteen  times.  He  was  "  chief  of  the  guides,"  and  wore 
a  medal.  We  could  trace  well  the  path  over  the  awfully 
dangerous  solitudes  used  by  those  who  are  so  foolishly 
venturesome  as  to  ascend  Mont  Blanc  ;  and  our  memory 
of  it  has  lent  a  painful  interest  to  the  accidents  which 
we  have  since  read  of,  for  we  know  into  what  fearful 
crevasses  have  fallen  those  doomed  men  who  perished 
there. 

The  older  guides  shook  their  heads  when  they  talked 
about  it.  "I  do  not  like  to  look  at  '  him,' "  said  one  old 
fellow ;  and  yet  he  lives  at  the  chalet  at  Plauprat,  and 
is  obliged  to  look  at  "  him "  always.  But  we  were 
obliged  to  descend  and  to  look  at  "him"  no  more. 
Majestic  monarch  of  mountains !  he  gives  you  thoughts 
and  memories  which  will  follow  you  all  the  days  of  your 


ASCENT   OF   THE   SIMPLON  173 

life,  which  will  be  blessed  companions  for  a  sleepless 
night,  and  which  will  not  be  unworthy  as  the  solace  of 
the  bed  of  sickness  and  of  death. 

"  Give  me  a  great  thought,"  said  the  dying  Herder, 
"  that  I  may  solace  myself." 

We  lost  the  Matterhorn.  We  presented  ourselves  at 
Yisp,  as,  according  to  programme,  it  is  proper  to  do; 
but  it  "  snowed  and  it  blowed,"  and  the  expedition  was 
abandoned.  Yisp  was  dreadfully  sad.  The  inunda- 
tions of  the  spring  of  1869  had  been  very  severe,  and 
that  disastrous  stream  of  sand  and  stone  swept  across 
the  valley,  ruining  the  village  and  adjacent  meadows. 

We  w^ere  glad  to  leave  it  behind  us  and  begin  to 
ascend  the  Simplon.  Here  we  leave  on  our  left  the 
town  of  Brieg,  w^hich  seems  to  be  all  turrets,  belonging 
to  a  family  who  own  the  appropriate  name  of  Stock- 
alper.  Then  we  wind  slowly  and  tediously  upward.  It 
takes  four  horses  to  drag  us  and  our  carriage.  What  a 
colossal  undertaking,  this  road !  We  have  a  weary 
time  of  it  up  to  the  *'  second  refuge."  Here  we  get  a 
level,  and  bend  round  the  valley  of  the  Gauther;  here 
we  begin  to  traverse  ''galleries,"  to  go  through  the  solid 
rock,  to  span  precipices;  so  on  and  upward  to  the  sum- 
mit, the  region  above  vegetation,  where  we  see  the  red 
moss,  the  only  thing  which  grows  above  the  snow. 

Here  is  a  hospice,  and  some  of  the  real  St.  Bernard 
dogs  have  been  brought  here.  These  intelligent  creat- 
ures flew  round  and  round  our  carriage,  and  gave  us 
an  almost  human  greeting.  We  could  imagine  how  glad 
we  should  be  to  see  them  if  we  were  ''  the  traveller  lost 
in  the  snow"  of  the  old  picture-books.  As  it  was,  we 
were  sorry  when  the  crack  of  the  postilion's  whip  dis- 
missed them  and  we  spun  rapidly  on  round  the  curves 
of  this  wonderful  road. 


174  AN   EPISTLE   TO   POSTERITY 

Our  eyes  were  caught  here  by  a  glorious  view.  The 
Bernese  Alps  in  all  their  majesty  rose  high  in  the 
heavens,  above  and  beyond  all  the  other  peaks,  and  the 
clouds  seemed  to  part  that  we  might  catch  a  glimpse  of 
this  splendid  chain.  After  this  it  was  a  succession  of 
wonders.  We  drove  behind  and  under  miniature  Mag- 
aras,  which  were  conducted  over  our  heads.  We  drove 
through  rocks,  and  began  to  feel  that  we  were  on  Alad- 
din's enchanted  carpet,  and  might  easily  float  on  the 
air.  There  is  no  describing  this  road.  It  must  be 
experienced  to  be  believed.  You  surprise  the  secrets  of 
the  Alpine  world,  and  descend  with  the  gnomes  and 
rise  with  the  spirits.  Glaciers,  waterfalls,  snow  moun- 
tains, precipices,  become  familiar  objects. 

I  am  ashamed  to  say  we  were  very  hungry  when  we 
reached  Simplon,  and  that  we  enjoyed  the  roast  par- 
tridges and  good  wine  of  Fletschorn.  Great  emotions 
are  appetizing,  there  is  no  doubt ;  so  is  the  keen  air  of 
the  Alps. 

Here  we  begin  (after  dinner)  perceptibly  to  descend. 
Here  we  put  an  iron  drag  on  our  wheels,  which  grinds 
horribly.  Here  we  drive  into  the  tremendous,  savage, 
grand  gorge  of  Gondo.  Gustave  Dore  might  well  paint 
these  slate  rocks,  innocent  of  vegetation — these  mighty 
gaps,  these  terrible,  gloomy  precipices,  this  rushing 
water — for  his  entrance  to  the  Inferno.  Over  your  head 
leaps  the  tremendous  torrent  of  the  Frassinone.  You 
are  carried  behind  and  under  it ;  as  you  pause  to  look 
back,  your  senses  fail  to  convince  you  that  you  have 
done  so  wonderful  a  thing. 

On  one  of  these  galleries,  cut  in  the  solid  rock,  is  the 
memorable  inscription : 

"^re  Italo,  1805.    Napoleon,  Imperator." 


IN   PARIS   AGAIN  175 

"  Imperator  "  indeed  ! 

So  down  and  down  to  Isella  and  a  custom-honse. 

Then  come  the  chestnut  and  the  vine.  The  air  is  soft 
and  delicate.  Have  the  past  few  hours  been  real,  or  has 
a  passionate  dream  crept  over  you?  You  cross  the 
Doveria,  gentle  name  for  the  same  wild  torrent  which 
has  torn  so  fiercely  along  your  path.  The  maize-fields, 
the  vines  springing  from  tree  to  tree,  the  all-pervading 
chestnut,  the  white  villages,  the  graceful  campanile  ris- 
ing in  the  air,  the  bounteous  landscape — all  tell  you  that 
you  have  reached  the  land  of  your  dreams.  This  is 
Italy. 

We  descended  at  Domo  d'Ossola,  a  quaint,  dirty,  and 
picturesque  characteristic  Italian  town.  How  strange 
this  immediate  difference  of  nationality !  We  are  only 
ten  hours  from  a  chalet,  a  glacier,  and  a  snow  mountain, 
and  here  no  one  stone  lies  upon  another  as  it  does  in 
Switzerland.  We  are  eating  figs ;  we  are  surrounded  by 
large-eyed,  swarthy  Italians.  A  different  race,  a  differ- 
ent clime,  a  different  architecture,  a  different  language ; 
and  different  they  will  remain  forever. 

We  returned  home  by  way  of  Nuremburg,  Strasburg, 
and  Paris.  I  fortunately  saw  the  Tuileries  and  the 
column  in  the  Place  Yendome  before  they  were  oblit- 
erated by  the  coming  Commune.  I  saw  Louis  Napoleon, 
the  Emperor — Napoleon  III. — walking  in  the  grounds 
of  the  Tuileries,  a  short  and  unimpressive  man.  He  was 
gazing  at  an  angry  crowd  outside  the  gates  as  I  saw 
him,  and  there  was  something  great  in  his  calm  and  his 
sangfroid ;  yes,  cold  blood  described  this  colorless  man. 

Mr.  Washburn,  our  minister,  a  great  man,  came  to  see 
us,  he  who  was  to  play  so  honorable  a  part  during  the 
Commune.  I  remember  that  he  came  with  Mr.  Marsh 
to  dine  with  us,  for  Mr.  Marsh  had  come  up  from  Flor- 


176  AN    EPISTLE   TO   POSTEEITY 

ence  to  meet  Mrs.  Marsh  on  her  way  home  from  Amer- 
ica ;  and  our  courier  beamed  with  delight  as  he  would 
throw  open  the  door  of  our  salon  at  the  Hotel  West- 
minster, saying,  proudly, "  Madam,  the  American  Minis- 
ter to  France  is  at  the  door !"     Angelo  felt  triumphant. 

We  gave  them  a  good  dinner  at  the  Hotel  Westmin- 
ster, which  then  boasted  the  best  cook  in  Paris,  so  An- 
gelo said,  and  Angelo  was  our  courier. 

I  made  my  first  acquaintance  with  the  dinners  of 
Paris  in  1869,  Avhich  is  an  epoch  in  one's  existence. 
We  drove  the  old  historical  routes,  to  see  this  immense 
grand  thing  called  Paris,  for  three  days ;  then  we  be- 
gan to  receive  our  friends — their  names  was  legion — and 
then  we  went  to  the  Louvre,  and  we  began  to  dine  out, 
and  then  —  ah!  to  the  Comedie  Francaise  and  to  the 
opera ! 

Dressmaking  came  in  here ;  and  after  a  month's  visit, 
with  but  a  fragmentary  idea  of  Paris — something  bewil- 
dering, rainbow -tinted,  the  centre  of  civilization;  the 
home  of  the  great,  gay,  laughing  crowd ;  of  thought,  fash- 
ion, intellect,  music ;  of  Victor  Hugo  and  of  Eugenie, 
whom  we  had  just  seen  at  Venice — I  left  the  French 
capital,  not  to  see  it  again  for  many  years. 


CHAPTER  XI 

The  New  York  of  Twenty  Years  Ago — Social  and  Geographical 
Changes  —  Grace  Church  and  "Old  Brown"  —  Three  of  New 
York's  Distinguished  Hostesses — Mrs.  Roberts's  Dinner  to  Presi- 
dent and  Mrs.  Hayes— Mr.  Evarts  and  his  Donkey  Story — Trav- 
ers  and  Jerome — Bret  Harte — George  Boker  and  Calvert — Our 
School  for  Scandal. 

I  HAD  lived  in  but  two  houses  in  New  York,  which  is, 
I  believe,  an  unusual  experience.  One  was  at  6  West 
Eleventh  Street :  now  it  is  no  more — torn  down  to  add  to 
the  St.  Denis  Hotel.  But  it  was  a  convenient  and  pret- 
ty house,  opposite  a  garden.  This  vacant  plot  was  owned 
by  Mr.  Peter  Lorillard,  who  indeed  owned  nearly  every- 
thing about  there,  including  a  fine  house  in  which  he 
lived  on  Tenth  Street,  and  where  I  used  to  go  to  hand- 
some balls  and  weddings.  Our  house  was  owned  by 
Professor  Renwick,  a  learned  old  Scotchman,  whose  for- 
mal calls  gave  me  great  pleasure.  He  used  to  treat  me 
to  a  half-hour  of  his  fine  old  conversation  while  I  was 
asking  for  an  addition  to  the  dining-room  or  a  better 
range  in  the  kitchen.  If  the  talk  fell  upon  Sir  Walter 
Scott,  whom  he  had  known,  or  upon  literary  subjects 
generally,  the  professor  became  very  generous ;  but  if  it 
fell  upon  city  jobs,  or  sudden  new  fortunes,  or  New  York 
politics,  the  professor's  purse-strings  tightened,  and  his 
characteristic  Scotch  face  grew  very  sombre.  He  was, 
however,  a  generous  landlord,  and  used  to  toss  my  babies 
up  towards  the  roses  and  violets  in  the  opposite  garden. 
Ten  years,  however,  changed  all  that  surrounding,  and 


178  AN   EPISTLE   TO   POSTEEITY 

we  had  to  move  up  town.  We  went  to  the  end  of  the 
earth,  even  to  Thirty-second  Street !  I  remember  that 
the  omnibuses  stopped  on  Fifth  Avenue  at  Thirty-sec- 
ond Street,  turned  round,  and  went  back  again  to  their 
down-town  stables  in  Eighth  Street.  If  we  wished  to 
go  farther  w^e  had  to  take  the  Sixth  Avenue  or  Broad- 
way Eailroad. 

Eleventh  Street  was  a  convenient  place  to  live  in ;  we 
could  walk  around  to  the  Ascension  Church,  w^here  Dr. 
Bedell  was  preaching  good  sermons,  and  where  we  wor- 
shipped, or  to  Washington  Square,  where  the  children 
picked  the  first  dandelions.  Our  friends  and  family  re- 
lations were  all  near  us,  and  of  a  summer  evening  we 
could  walk  down  to  the  theatres,  where  we  saw  Laura 
Keene,  Joe  Jefferson,  and  Sothern  play  in  Our  American 
Cousin,  I  saw  Sothern's  first  trip  into  ten  thousand 
pounds  in  Dundreary  (he  afterwards  told  me  that  little 
hop  was  an  accident),  and  Joseph  Jefferson's  beautiful 
love-making  in  the  funny  part  he  assumed  so  cleverly. 
I  saw  in  those  days  old  Wallack,  most  gallant  of  Don 
Caesar  de  Bazans,  and  also  The  Scholar,  a  fine  old  play, 
and  young  Lester  Wallack  coming  on,  to  be  the  pride 
and  delight  of  the  town,  as  handsome  as  Count  d'Orsay, 
and  alw^ays  well  dressed.  I  remember  how  beautifully 
somebody,  perhaps  Walcot,  played  in  Yictorine^  delight- 
ful dream!  and  how  gay  were  the  Placides.  It  all 
seems  so  stately  and  excellent,  such  consummate  act- 
ing, as  I  look  back  on  it.  Then  it  was  not  so  far  (in 
the  omnibus)  but  that  we  went  down  comfortably  to 
Burton's  little  theatre,  near  or  on  Park  Place,  to  see 
what  he  called  A  Tempest  in  a  Teapot.  And  then 
there  was  his  own  fine  rendering  of  CaUban  in  the 
greatest  of  Shakespeare's  plays.  I  remember  going  to 
see  this  with  Judge  Kent,  Mr.  Buggies,  and  Henry  T. 


THE   NEW   YORK   OF  TWENTY   YEARS   AGO  179 

Tuckerman  in  the  party,  and  they  all  gave  me  their  rem- 
iniscences of  the  great  actors  they  had  seen  in  this  play. 

Dear  me !  these  recollections  seem  to  take  me  back 
a  hundred  years. 

Dod  worth's  Hall  was  just  across  the  vivacious  Broad- 
way from  Eleventh  Street,  and  there  we  went  to  hear 
Fanny  Kemble.  Occasionally,  of  a  Sunday,  I  went  to 
Grace  Church,  considered  then  the  fashionable  church, 
with  old  Brown  for  the  sexton,  who  arranged  not  only 
all  the  funerals,  but  all  the  T^eddings  and  balls,  and 
all  the  parties,  and  whose  rector  went  to  so  many  din- 
ners that  the  wicked  said  that  he  occasionally  read, 
"Cherubim  and  Terrapin  continually  do  cry."  Old 
Brown  had  the  most  astonishing  memory  I  ever  met ; 
he  was  beyond  even  the  Koyal  family  of  England.  He 
knew  more  about  us  than  we  did  ourselves. 

At  a  ball  he  turned  to  a  lady,  as  she  was  going  out, 
and  remarked,  facetiously,  "  Did  you  see  Miss  Stockman, 
all  draped  with  ivy?  Well,  her  gown  is  that  torn  that 
she  is  a  ruin."  Brown  was  a  wit  and  a  punster,  and  he 
amused  New  York  for  forty  years.  I  remember  com- 
ing out  of  a  magnificent  ball  at  Mrs.  Gerry's,  or  Mr. 
Peter  Goelet's  house,  corner  of  Nineteenth  Street  and 
Broadway,  when  Brown  vouchsafed  the  information,  as 
I  got  into  my  carriage,  "  Ah,  madame,  this  has  been  an 
aristocratic  assemblage ;  no  mixture  hereP  I  remember 
that  ball,  in  the  fine,  old,  stately  rooms,  and  that  my 
kind  hostess,  when  the  "  german  "  crowded  us,  took  me 
behind  the  supper-table,  w^here  Peter  Yan  Dyck,  black- 
est of  men  and  best  of  cooks,  was  carving  a  most  succu- 
lent filet. 

There  are  no  such  oysters,  terrapin,  or  canvas-back 
duck  as  there  were  in  those  days ;  the  race  is  extinct. 
It  is  strange  how  things  degenerate.    At  this  ball  we 


180  AN   EPISTLE   TO   POSTEEITY 

had  champagne  out  of  silver  goblets !  Peter  Yan  Dyck 
and  his  assistants  were  so  indispensable  at  the  balls  and 
dinners  that  a  young  English  nobleman  asked  his  hostess 
if  our  black  servants  were  not  very  much  alike.  It  did 
not  occur  to  the  man  accustomed  to  a  ducal  entourage 
that  we  passed  them  on  from  one  to  another. 

The  women  were  dressed  in  large  hoops  then,  and  in 
flounced  dresses  with  much  real  lace,  and  the  hair  flow- 
ing downward  with  falling  garlands,  strictly  like  pict- 
ures of  Eugenie.  Indeed,  so  very  slavish  was  the  copy 
of  Eugenie  that  the  Eev.  Norman  McLeod,  in  an  arti- 
cle for  Harper's  Magazine  in  1868,  wrote:  "No  Eng- 
lish woman  asks  if  her  dress  is  appropriate  to  herself 
or  fitted  to  her  husband's  purse ;  she  simply  asks,  '  Is 
it  like  the  Empress  of  the  French  V  " 

Eugenie,  however,  is  to  be  remembered  with  grati- 
tude, for  she  introduced  small  bonnets.  We  used  to 
wear  to  the  theatre  little  bonnets  called  "  fanchons,"  a 
sort  of  half-handkerchief  tied  over  the  head,  which  ob- 
structed no  one's  view. 

Broadway  in  those  days  was  a  favorite  promenade, 
to  give  way  later  to  the  Fifth  Avenue,  and  of  a  Sunday 
Ave  would  walk  up  Fifth  Avenue  almost  to  Twenty- 
third  Street,  although  that  was  rather  a  stretch ;  and 
the  Hippodrome  occupied  the  lots  now  covered  by  the 
Fifth  Avenue  Hotel. 

I  passed,  the  other  day,  the  deserted  house  of  Mrs. 
Gerry,  which  I  used  to  think  so  lordly.  It  stands  alone 
now  amid  the  surrounding  sky-scrapers,  and  reminds 
me  of  Don  Quixote  going  out  to  fight  the  windmills. 
It  should  always  remain  to  mark  the  difference  between 
the  past  and  the  present. 

Fifth  Avenue  near  Tenth  Street,  and  the  upper  side 
of  Washington  Square,  have  changed  less  than  any  part 


THE  NEW  YORK  OF  TWENTY  YEARS  AGO       181 

of  New  York  that  I  remember.  All  that  fashionable 
locale  near  the  New  York  Hotel,  and  the  houses  oppo- 
site of  Mrs.  Mary  Jones  and  Mrs.  Colford  Jones,  queens  of 
fashion — all  have  disappeared  before  the  sledge-hammer 
of  progress. 

]^o.  6  West  Eleventh  Street  became  untenantable,  as 
I  have  said,  and  we  moved  up  to  the  remote  Thirty- 
second  Street — another  convenient  street.  From  its  win- 
dows I  saw  many  regiments  march  to  the  war,  and  heard 
the  Battle  Hymn  of  the  Kepublie  for  the  first  time. 

There  I  lived  for  nearly  thirty  years,  and  saw  a  great 
city  grow  up  above  us.  I  saw  much  of  the  society  of 
that  era.  It  was  the  fashion  for  people  to  stay  in  town 
more  than  it  is  now.  We  seldom  left  our  house  except- 
ing for  three  months  in  summer ;  but  we  were  fortunate 
in  having  two  country  homes  at  our  disposition,  and  we 
made  visits  about  New  York,  especially  to  the  delight- 
ful "Nevis,"  the  house  of  Hon.  James  A.  Hamilton, 
whence  Miss  Mary  Morris  Hamilton  would  drive  me  to 
Mr.  Aspin wall's  beautiful  home.  He  would  load  us  down 
with  greenhouse  flowers,  and  then  we  would  drive  on 
to  see  Washington  Irving.  I  remember  the  charming 
old  gentleman  looking  at  our  flowers  and  saying,  "  Oh, 
how  magnificent !  That  is  the  Deity's  idea  of  how 
things  should  be  done !  Why  do  we  ever  try  to  do  any- 
thing?" 

Mr.  Irving  gave  me  his  autograph  on  one  of  these  occa- 
sions, and  I  took  it  with  me  to  the  Alhambra,  and  read 
it  over  in  the  window  of  his  own  room  which  he  made 
so  world-famous.  I  plucked  an  ivy- leaf  from  his  win- 
dow where  he  looked  on  the  demure  Spanish  beauty, 
and  gazed  reverently  at  his  signature  in  the  travellers' 
book.     These  are  some  of  the  joys  of  travel. 

Miss  Angelica  Hamilton,  a  woman  of  delightful  man- 


182  AN    EPISTLE   TO    POSTERITY 

ners,  married  the  Hon.  R.  M.  Blatchford,  who  was  to  Mr. 
Webster  what  Atticus  was  to  Cicero — a  most  faithful 
friend.  His  purse  was  always  open  to  the  Defender, 
and  I  remember  that  he  said,  "Mr.  Webster  was  always 
short  just  five  hundred  dollars."  I  am  afraid  it  was 
sometimes  more.  Mr.  Blatchford  took  his  elegant  wife 
to  Europe.  Her  manners  were  supremely  beautiful ;  I 
would  rather  have  had  them  than  the  beauty  of  Helen 
of  Troy  or  the  wit  of  Aspasia.  She  died,  alas !  soon 
after. 

But  her  sister,  Mrs.  Schuyler,  was  the  thinker  and 
scholar  of  this  distinguished  family ;  indeed,  of  all  the 
women  I  have  known  she  was  one  of  the  most  dis- 
tinguished. Miss  Mary  Morris  Hamilton,  my  dearest 
friend,  after  the  death  of  this  sister,  married  her  broth- 
er-in-law, George  L.  Schuyler,  who  was  one  of  the  wits 
of  society.  In  their  house  in  Thirty-first  Street  I  met 
Edward  Everett,  Laurence  Oliphant  and  his  lovely 
wife,  George  MacDonald,  and  many  another  English 
author.  This  dear  woman  held  the  most  attractive  of 
the  fashionable  salons  of  her  day. 

When  I  went  to  Rome  in  1885  I  happened  to  meet 
Mrs.  Wynne  Finch,  the  mother  of  Mrs.  Ohphant.  She 
was  most  anxious  to  hear  of  me  the  last  news  of  this 
beloved  daughter,  who  with  her  husband  had  adopted 
the  strange  religious  leadership  of  one  Harris,  had  been 
separated  by  him  from  her  husband  and  her  kindred 
after  much  loss  of  money  and  happiness,  but  they  had 
come  together  again  and  went  off  to  convert  the  Jews 
at  Haifa.  They  both  wrote  strange  books  and  had  alto- 
gether a  most  romantic  history. 

Mrs.  Wynne  Finch  was  a  most  elegant  and  cosmo- 
politan woman,  and  had  a  salon  in  Paris  for  years.  She 
gave  me  an  interesting  account  of  Madame  Mohl,  that 


SOCIAL   AND   GEOGRAPHICAL   CHANGES  183 

extraordinary  person,  whose  hatred  of  Louis  iN'apoleon 
was  very  marked.  On  one  occasion,  wishing  to  call  on 
her  friend  the  Queen  of  Holland  at  the  Tuileries,  she  said 
to  her  coachman, "  Drive  to  the  Tuileries."  Her  servants 
knew  her  antipathy.  "  I  do  not  know  the  way  there, 
madame,"  said  the  tactful  cocker,  and  she  was  so  delighted 
with  his  tact  that  she  jumped  out  of  her  carriage  and 
kissed  him  on  the  spot ! 

Mrs.  Wynne  Finch  by  her  first  marriage  had  been 
Mrs.  L'Estrange,  and  had  many  lovely  daughters  and 
gifted  sons,  but  none  of  them  had  the  strange,  eventful 
history  of  poor  Mrs.  Laurence  Oliphant,  the  slave  of  a 
too  exacting  conscience. 

But  if  I  dare  to  unfold  these  memories,  which  cluster 
about  the  house  of  Hamilton  and  Schuyler,  I  shall  write 
forever. 

The  balls  outgrew  the  private  residences,  and  Del- 
raonico's,  at  the  corner  of  Fourteenth  Street  and  Fifth 
Avenue  (now,  alas!  a  carpet  store),  became  the  site  for 
the  Patriarchs'  and  the  Assembly  balls  and  the  private 
parties  at  which  daughters  were  introduced.  One  lib- 
eral gentleman  gave  a  ball  there  at  which  he  introduced 
a  pond  with  live  swans  floating  on  the  water. 

"  That  is  done  to  propitiate  the  Ledas  (leaders)  of  so- 
ciety, I  suppose,"  said  a  wit. 

These  beautiful  rooms,  many  blue  parlors  going  off  in 
suites,  were  the  scene  of  a  fine  fancy  ball  in  the  '70's. 
Mrs.  Belmont  was  at  the  head  of  it,  and  it  was  enor- 
mously successful.  I  remember  being  received,  as  I  en- 
tered, by  Mr.  Gracie  King  in  a  court  suit,  which  he  had 
inherited  from  his  father,  worn  by  Hon.  Eufus  King 
when  Minister  to  England.  He  looked  his  part  most 
completely. 

These  rooms  were  also  the  scene  of  a  very  good  story 


184  AN   EPISTLE   TO  POSTERITY 

told  by  Governor  Fish  of  his  own  experience.  The 
leaders  of  the  german  were  not  always  very  polite  to 
the  elderly,  but  of  course  they  have  improved  since. 

The  Hon.  Hamilton  Fish,  just  home  from  Grant's 
cabinet,  was  doubtless  our  first  citizen  ;  he  was  the  most 
amiable  and  quietly  dignified  and  self-effacing  of  great 
men.'  He  had  accompanied  his  beautiful  daughters  to 
a  ball  at  Delmonico's,  and  when  they  were  to  dance  the 
german  he  retired  to  an  adjacent  parlor  to  await  their 
pleasure. 

A  young  man  came  up  to  him  and  said,  "  Want  that 
chair,  sir,  for  the  german."  The  Governor  gave  it  up 
peacefully  and  retreated  to  another  room,  when  pres- 
ently another  dancer  followed  him,  and  said : 

"  Have  to  get  out  of  this,  old  gentleman.  Want  the 
chair  for  the  german." 

The  Governor  went  still  farther  afield,  w^hen  a  third 
approached  him. 

"  Will  you  tell  me  where  1  am  to  go  ?"  he  asked. 

"  Well,"  said  ISTo.  3,  "  if  I  were  you,  old  man,  I  think 
I  would  go  home." 

"  It  was  not  always  thus,"  but  I  am  afraid  that  it  was 
sometimes.  Young  men  did  not,  as  a  rule,  turn  gov- 
ernors and  statesmen  out  of  the  ball-room,  but  the  ger- 
man was  very  exacting,  and  they  needed  the  chairs. 
Later  on  the  Patriarchs  and  the  Assemblies  moved  on 
to  the  upper  Delmonico's,  which  is  now  nearly  a  thing 
of  the  past. 

1^0  account  of  old  New  York,  or  even  recent  E'ew 
York,  could  be  complete  without  a  mention  of  Mrs. 
J.  J.  Astor,  the  mother  of  William  Waldorf  Astor,  the 
very  grande  dame,  the  great  entertainer,  and  the  w^om- 
an  of  thought,  of  heart,  and  of  most  charitable  life. 
Mrs.  Astor's  balls  and  dinners  were  perhaps  the  finest 


MRS.  J.  J.  ASTOR — MRS.  HAMILTON   FISH  185 

that  IS'ew  York  boasted  for  twenty  years.  She  had 
great  taste  in  floral  decoration,  and  at  her  splendid  balls 
she  would  cover  the  clock-face  with  flowers,  a  most 
gracious  way  of  hinting  that  we  were  not  to  go  home 
early.  Of  course,  her  house,  her  fine  pictures,  and  her 
admirable  supper  were  always  festive ;  but  her  welcome, 
and  that  of  her  kind,  generous,  unpretending  husband, 
formed  the  real  luxury  of  the  reception. 

She  was  the  first  of  our  rich  women  to  wear  many 
diamonds,  and  she  always  looked  as  if  they  wearied  her. 
Her  heart  was  not  in  this  world,  or  its  pomps  and  vani- 
ties. She  was  most  interested  when  she  was  down  at 
the  Newsboys'  Lodging-house,  with  the  dirty  hands  of 
the  little  ragamuffins  in  hers,  as  she  told  them  stories ; 
and  she  delighted  to  fill  her  windows,  as  she  did  on  the 
day  of  General  Grant's  funeral,  with  shop-girls,  who  saw 
from  that  coign  of  vantage  that  historical  spectacle. 
Philanthropy,  indeed,  was  her  passion. 

She  was  a  very  highly  educated  woman,  and  superin- 
tended the  final  touches  to  her  son's  education  in  Europe 
for  several  years.  She  had  a  knowledge  of  and  love  for 
music.  Indeed,  such  a  leader  in  the  curious  conglom- 
erate which  we  call  our  society  was  most  elevating  and 
purifying ;  her  loss  was  immeasurable. 

Another  such  leader  was  Mrs.  Hamilton  Fish,  a  woman 
of  the  broadest  good  sense  and  a  tact  which,  in  her  long 
life  before  the  public,  as  wife  of  governor,  senator,  and 
secretary  of  state,  was  always  most  exactingly  tested, 
and  was  never  found  wanting.  She  was  an  elegant, 
stately-looking  woman,  and  a  dear  and  good  one.  She 
had  a  sly  little  sense  of  and  love  for  humor,  but  I  do  not 
believe  that  any  one  ever  saw  her  laugh  at  anybody. 
She  was  extremely  unselfish  with  her  time  and  strength. 
I  fear  Washington  killed  her. 


186  AN   EPISTLE   TO    POSTERITY 

Mrs.  Belmont,  very  beautiful,  very  elegant,  with  a 
gift  of  exclusiveness,  was  another  leader  whom  I  greatly 
admired.  She  seemed  to  me  to  have  most  unusual  qual- 
ities. The  breath  of  scandal  never  touched  her ;  she 
could  walk  over  burning  ploughshares  and  not  burn  her 
delicate  feet.  Without  making  any  pretensions,  she  had 
admirable  common -sense,  enjoyed  travel  and  pictures, 
and  all  the  refinements  of  the  wealth  so  freely  lavished 
upon  her.  She  was  a  good  mother  and  a  good  friend. 
I  owed  to  her  very  much  of  my  pleasure  in  twenty  years 
of  New  York,  and  I  shall  always  mourn  for  these  three 
ladies,  because  they  filled  not  only  the  place  of  friend, 
but  they  filled  my  ideal  of  what  ladies  should  be. 

Mr.  Belmont  had  great  talents  for  an  entertainer ;  he 
liked  it,  and  he  took  trouble  for  it.  He  had  the  best 
table  service,  the  most  appropriate  livery,  the  hand- 
somest house,  and  the  best  picture-gallery  in  town,  and 
that  as  long  ago  as  1864. 

I  feel  always  wounded  as  I  go  by  that  hospitable 
corner,  and  see  that  a  sky-scraper  has  filled  in  the  spot 
where  the  early  traditions  of  good  society  were  so  elab- 
orately cultivated  in  the  Belmont  house. 

Another  hospitable  hostess  was  Mrs.  S.  L.  M.  Barlow. 
"When  death  took  her  a  ray  of  sunlight  went  out  of  all 
our  lives.  That  cheery  laugh,  that  open  hand,  that 
noble  heart!  Peace  to  her  ashes!  She  has  "left  no 
copy." 

Between  1870  and  1890  there  blossomed  in  New  York 
the  fair  and  consummate  flower  of  art ;  picture-galleries 
began  to  be  formed  and  beautiful  houses  to  be  built. 
The  day  of  the  architect  and  the  internal  decorator  be- 
came a  bright  one,  and  it  was  possible  to  point  to  the 
Eoman  Catholic  Cathedral,  the  Jewish  Synagogue,  and 
many  fine  churches  and  some  palaces  as  movements  on- 


EARLY   PATRONS   OF   ART  187 

ward  and  upward.  The  palaces  have  increased  wonder- 
fully in  the  last  ten  years. 

I  remember  taking  a  friend  in  one  day  to  the  picture- 
galleries  of  Mr.  Stewart,  Mr.  John  Taylor  Johnson,  and 
Mr.  M.  O.  Eoberts,  and  there  were  in  that  neighborhood 
the  fine  collection  of  Mr.  Belmont  and  Mr.  Cutting, 
while  up  town  Mr.  John  Wolfe  and  Miss  Kitty  Wolfe 
had  delightful  pictures.  Mr.  Marquand,  always  a  lib- 
eral patron  of  art,  has,  I  believe,  denuded  his  fine  house 
of  its  treasures  in  order  to  enrich  the  Museum  of  Art. 
Mr.  Morris  K.  Jesup  was  an  early  patron  of  American 
art,  and  at  his  dinners  one  could  gaze  into  the  depths  of 
an  American  forest  painted  by  Kensett,  or  on  the  ruins 
of  the  Acropolis  by  Church.  All  these  splendid  collec- 
tions but  the  latter  are  now  dispersed,  and  only  the 
very  valuable  gallery  of  Mr.  W.  H.  Yanderbilt  remains 
intact,  I  believe  —  a  singular  exemplification  of  the 
changeful  character  of  ]^ew  York. 

But  New  York  was  full  of  handsome  houses  and  good 
dinners.  Mrs.  William  Astor  built  a  ballroom  to  her 
superb  house  and  made  it  a  picture-gallery,  where  every 
sense  of  beauty  was  gratified.  Alas !  not  one  stone  re- 
mains upon  another  of  that  scene  of  radiant  hospitality. 
The  pictures  are,  however,  safe  in  another  and  more 
beautiful  house. 

Such  a  change  in  the  memory  of  one  person  is,  how- 
ever, very  remarkable.  I  only  know  one  family  who 
are  living  in  the  same  house  which  they  occupied  when 
I  first  came  to  New  York. 

The  radical  changes  in  society  from  the  small,  well- 
considered  hundreds  to  the  countless  thousands  have 
of  course  destroyed  the  neighborly  character  of  the 
strange  conglomerate.  It  is  more  ornamental  and  much 
more  luxurious  now  than  then. 


k 


188  AN   EPISTLE   TO    POSTERITY 

The  dinners  were  every  day  gaining  in  a  wealth  of 
floral  decoration ;  the  chef  had  long  since  assumed  his 
place  in  luxurious  houses.  But  the  pen  would  be  weary 
that  attempted  the  business  of  chronicling  l^ew  York 
dinners  even  of  twenty  years  ago. 

I  remember  one,  which  I  may  be  permitted  to  describe, 
as  it  was  given  to  a  President. 

About  1877  Mrs.  Marshall  O.  Eoberts  entertained 
President  Hayes  in  that  fine  dining-room — it  has  few 
superiors  to-day — where  the  white  marble  trim  stair- 
cases led  up  to  a  beautiful  balcony  and  the  walls  were 
hung  with  pictures. 

Mr.  Story  was  present,  and  so  was  Mr.  Evarts,  then 
Secretary  of  State ;  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Hayes,  Judge  Brady, 
the  Hon.  Clarence  Seward,  the  Hon.  John  Jay,  and 
some  very  brilliant  women. 

Mrs.  Hayes  was  a  remarkable  woman.  Mr.  Story  said 
she  was  the  apotheosis  of  the  Indian  type,  an  American 
red  Indian.  She  was  very  dark,  with  the  most  extraor- 
dinary massive  hair  of  intense  blackness,  and  the  fine 
dark  eye  which  belongs  to  such  hair,  high  cheek-bones, 
a  very  large  mouth  full  of  splendid  teeth,  and  withal  a 
feminine  grace  and  beauty  and  a  most  gentle  expres- 
sion. 

The  conversation  was  gay  and  witty  and  informal. 
Mr.  Evarts,  who  always  commanded  the  situation,  told 
his  best  stories,  and  on  being  asked  if  he  did  not  find 
the  drinking  of  "different  kinds  of  wines  at  a  dinner" 
injurious,  said,  "]N^o,  it  is  the  indifferent  wines  which 
trouble  me." 

I  suppose  no  company  was  then  considered  complete 
without  Judge  Brady,  who  was  a  wit  and  humorist 
of  the  highest  character.  He  was  always  led  up  to 
his  best  by  Mr.  Clarence  Seward,  who  supplemented 


ME.  EVARTS   AND   MR.   STORY  189 

the  Judge's  Irish  overflow  by  his  own  keen  wit.  This 
noble  pair  of  wits  played  then  the  same  parts  which  the 
Hon.  Chauncey  M.  Depew  and  General  Horace  Porter 
take  now  at  the  dinners  which  are  fortunate  enough  to 
secure  them. 

Mr.  Story,  on  being  promised  a  supper  at  the  Century 
Club,  answered,  "  And  Story  'd  earn  an  animated  bust !" 
Judge  Brady  made  a  speech  in  German,  and  Mr.  Evarts 
(at  the  request  of  a  lady)  told  his  famous  donkey  story, 
not,  however,  without  an  eloquent  mock  protest,  which 
was  overruled.  "That  you,  madarae,  a  literary  lady, 
devoted  to  the  highest  thoughts,  should  show  such  an 
interest  in  a  donkey  is  incredible." 

"  But  tell  it  to  Mr.  Story,  who  has  been  so  long  ban- 
ished from  his  native  land." 

"  Arid  donkeys  V 

So  Mr.  Evarts  began  with  a  long  discourse  as  to  the 
difficulty  of  finding  a  donkey  in  IS'ew  York  for  his  little 
daughter :  finally  he  had  to  go  to  ;N"ew  Jersey  for  one. 
Having  got  it  up  to  his  country-place,  the  donkey  mis- 
erably howled  and  groaned,  to  the  despair  of  the  tender- 
hearted little  girl.  However,  after  listening  awhile  to 
the  donkey's  lamentations,  she  fetched  a  deep  sigh  of 
relief  and  said  : 

"  He  won't  be  so  lonesome  after  Father  comes." 

When  this  agreeable  party  broke  up  we  went  in  to 
the  picture-galler}^,  where  stood  a  little  marble  daughter 
of  Mr.  Story's — I  think,  an  "  Ariadne."  He  and  his  son 
Waldo  stopped  and  caressed  it,  as  they  might  have  done 
a  relative.  A  lady  present  said  to  the  President,  "  Does 
Mr.  Evarts  obey  you  ?" 

"  ;N"o,  madame,"  said  Mr.  Hayes ;  "  wherever  Mr.  Ev- 
arts is,  he  governs." 

The  Hon.  John  Jay,  most  genial  and  handsomest  of 


190  AN   EPISTLE   TO    POSTERITY 

men,  was  always  an  ornament  to  all  the  dinners  of  that 
day,  and  of  all  his  days.  As  presiding  officer  of  the 
Union  League  Club  he  was  as  much  of  an  attraction 
as  Sir  Frederic  Leighton  at  the  opening  of  the  Royal 
Academy  in  London. 

In  Mr.  Jay,  character,  learning,  and  suavity,  patriot- 
ism and  strength,  and  "  that  grand  old  name  of  gentle- 
man "  met.  He  was  the  finest  type  of  what  blood  can 
do.  You  saw  his  fair  grandmother  and  his  learned  an- 
cestor who  wore  the  ermine  so  spotlessly  in  every  word 
and  lineament  and  gesture.  He  was  exactly  the  man 
for  a  foreign  mission. 

And  what  record  of  those  days  could  be  worth  much 
which  left  out  the  name  of  Travers,  the  wit,  the  bon- 
vivant,  the  preux  chevalier?  A  more  brilliant,  scintil- 
lating mind  seldom  had  a  chance  to  impress  itself  on 
two  or  three  decades  of  social  life.  Travers  was  a  social 
hero,  a  constant  joy  and  pleasure. 

Mr.  Travers  was  so  lucky  as  to  stammer,  which  gave 
his  words  the  last  touch  of  success.  You  had  to  wait 
for  them.  His  brain  moved  with  such  lightning  rapid- 
ity that  his  lips  could  not  catch  his  ideas.  He  had  a 
subtle  common-sense,  which  gave  his  wit  startling  em- 
phasis. He  dared  to  tell  truths  which  a  stupid  man 
could  not  have  done ;  and  he  grew  to  be  the  "  king's 
jester"  for  society,  a  generous  heart,  a  royal  host,  a 
lovely  and  lovable  friend,  successful  in  all  he  undertook : 
he  even  met  death  with  a  joke.  Some  one  said  to  him 
in  his  last  illness,  "  Well,  Travers,  you  have  burned  the 
candle  at  both  ends." 

"Ye-es-s,"  said  he,  "and  now  some-some-somebody 
has  lighted  it  in  the  middle." 

He  added  greatly  to  the  jollity  of  society  while  he 
lived,  and  has  been  deeply  regretted,  sincerely  honored, 


THE   BEAUTIES   OF   '76  191 

and  faithfully  remembered.  To  this  fine,  courageous 
soul  were  added  a  philanthropy  and  generosity  which  he 
carefully  hid  from  the  world.  Like  him  was  another 
wit  and  man  of  fashion,  Griswold  Grey,  who  "  did  good 
by  stealth,  and  blushed  to  find  it  fame."  Peace  to  their 
ashes ! 

Leonard  W.  Jerome,  a  singularly  handsome  man,  was 
also  famous  in  those  days.  He  and  Travers  had  made 
fortunes  very  suddenly,  and  proceeded  to  spend  them 
magnificently.  Mr.  Jerome  built 'a  theatre  in  the  then 
Union  League  Club  House,  where  were  given  tableaux 
and  private  theatricals  for  charity,  the  like  of  which 
have  never  been  seen  since.  Mrs.  Eonalds  made  her 
first  triumph  there  as  prima  donna ;  and  the  beauties  of 
1876 — Miss  Minnie  Stevens,  Miss  Adelaide  Townsend, 
Miss  Pussie  Breeze,  Miss  May,  Mrs.  Kives,  Mrs.  Jones, 
Mrs.  Hunt — left  a  record  of  loveliness  which  the  pen 
of  their  lady -manager  proudly  records  as  one  of  the 
events  of  her  life. 

I  took  charge  of  two  sets  of  tableaux  at  this  theatre; 
and  we  returned  such  a  fabulous  sum  for  the  "  Southern 
Kelief "  in  1868,  and  in  1876  for  the  Centennial,  that  I 
hesitate  to  record  it  for  fear  of  being  suspected  of  exag- 
geration.   Times  were  not  so  hard  as  they  are  now. 

I  remember  a  dinner  at  Newport  (one  of  many)  given 
to  Bret  Harte  by  the  publisher,  Mr.  Charles  J.  Peter- 
son, on  his  first  arrival  from  California,  which  was  nota- 
ble for  its  good  talk. 

Hon.  George  Bancroft,  Mrs.  Julia  Ward  Howe  (still 
young  and  lovely  at  seventy-seven),  Mr.  John  B.  La- 
trobe,  of  Baltimore ;  the  Hon.  George  Boker,  dramatist 
and  man  of  fashion ;  Mrs.  Boker,  very  handsome,  w^ere 
conspicuous  guests,  and  the  company  included  about 
six  more,  all  summoned  to  do  honor  to  the  young  man 


193  AN   EPISTLE    TO   POSTEEITY 

who  leaped  from  obscurity  to  the  very  heights  of  Olym- 
pus in  two  bounds — The  Lxick  of  Roaring  Camjp  and 
The  Heathen  Chinee, 

"  Just  think  of  the  degradation  of  going  down  to 
posterity  as  the  author  of  such  trash  as  The  Heathen 
Chinee^'^  he  said  to  me  at  that  dinner. 

He  was  a  slender,  rather  handsome  young  man  with 
very  black  hair,  and  looked  as  Dickens  did  at  his  age. 
He  was  pathetically  pleased  to  get  rid  of  California, 
which  he  hated.  He  admired  some  wild  daisies  which 
decorated  Mrs.  Peterson's  always  beautiful  table,  and 
showed  them  to  his  wife.  He  gave  me  such  an  idea 
of  the  dreariness,  absence  of  color,  and  degradation 
of  a  mining  camp  that  I  never  read  one  of  his  immor- 
tal stories  that  I  do  not  seem  to  taste  that  dust -laden 
air. 

I  had  the  pleasure  during  ten  years  to  assist  at  lion- 
izing this  great  genius,  and  he  was  so  natural,  simple, 
and  charming  that  he  became  a  familiar  figure  in  my 
family.  I  met  him  in  London  at  the  height  of  his  for- 
eign fame,  in  1884.  White-haired  and  ruddy-faced,  he 
had  become  a  typical  John  Bull.  I  saw  his  pleasure 
when  a  beautiful  young  girl  recited  Her  Letter  before 
a  grand  company  of  mingled  American  and  English 
friends — a  dinner  which  brought  Henry  James,  Hamil- 
ilton  Aide,  Cyrus  W.  Field,  Sir  John  and  Lady  Con- 
stance Leslie,  the  Hon.  Mrs.  Wellesley,  Mrs.  Procter, 
Mr.  Lowell,  and  many  others  together — and  I  think  his 
few  words  of  delicate  thanks  and  compliment  to  her 
were  worthy  of  a  prince ;  and  indeed  he  was,  and  is,  a 
prince  of  genius. 

It  is  curious  that  his  fellow-humorist  and  old  friend 
John  Hay  expressed  a  similar  disgust  at  the  success 
of  his  famous  PiTie  Coimty  Ballads,  and  wished  that 


BOKER  S   DRAMAS  193 

he  had  never  written  Little  Breeches.  Mr.  Hay  has 
Avritten  so  much  of  a  different  character  that  he  can 
afford  to  acknowledge  Little  Breeches  as  a  legitimate 
child  of  his  varied  and  most  elegant  mind.  Perhaps 
this  poor  little  vagrant  may  live  longer  than  any  of 
them.  Even  Castilian  Days  may  be  put  on  the  highest 
shelf  before  the  PiJce  County  Ballads  are  removed 
from  the  library  table.  At  any  rate,  neither  author 
can  call  back  these  unloved  children.  Like  Don  John 
of  Austria,  that  brave  boy  who  wore  victory  in  his  cap, 
they  have  been  able  to  fight  their  own  battles,  and  Jim 
Bliidsoe  commands  the  tears  of  the  world. 

The  Hon.  George  Boker,  so  well  known  as  poet  and 
patriot,  was  then  in  the  very  pride  and  prime  of  his 
beauty  and  fame.  It  is  astonishing  that  his  tragedies 
and  plays  could  be  put  on  the  stage  as  they  fell  from 
his  pen,  almost  without  change.  They  are  delightful 
reading.  The  Betrothal,  Calaynos,  Anne  Boleyn,  Leo- 
nor  de  Guzman,  and  Francesca  da  Rim^ini  are  all  de- 
lightful. I  wonder  they  are  not  more  quoted  and 
talked  of  to-day.  His  occasional  odes  had  such  celeb- 
rity during  the  war  time  that  these,  his  delicate  reveries, 
seemed  to  slip  out  of  men's  minds.  I  find  a  great 
many  young  poets  dip  into  these  volumes  and  bring 
away  much  gold.  The  Podesta^s  Daughter,  The  Ode  to 
England,  The  Rose  of  Granada,  are  mines  of  poetical 
wealth. 

Of  Boker's  sonnets  Leigh  Hunt  said  that  "they  ex- 
celled all  sonnets,  excepting  those  of  Shakespeare." 
They  are  delicious ;  two  which  occur  to  me.  Hence,  Cold 
Despair!  and  To  Win  and  Lose  Thee,  are  among  the 
most  beautiful  that  he  wrote.  This  rare  man,  born  to 
fortune  and  to  a  fashionable  position  which  he  enjoyed, 
kept  up  his  classics  and  his  literary  work  to  the  end. 

13 


194  AN   EPISTLE   TO   POSTERITY 

He  founded  the  first  Union  League  Club  in  the  United 
States,  and  during  and  after  war  times  was  an  eminent- 
ly useful  citizen  as  well  as  poet. 

Indeed,  this  famous  dinner  in  that  beautiful  old 
Elizabethan  house  built  by  Mr.  De  Lancey  Kane,  and 
called  Red  Cross,  and  in  what  I  still  consider  one  of 
the  handsomest  rooms  at  JSTewport,  was  often  quoted  by 
Mr.  Bancroft  as  memorable  for  Mr.  Boker's  shining  talk 
on  that  day.  There  was  something  of  the  grandeur  and 
gloom  of  Hawthorne  about  Mr.  Boker  when  he  was  se- 
rious. At  a  dinner  he  preferred  to  be  humorous.  His 
temperament  was  changeful,  as  is  always  the  case  with 
the  children  of  genius.  He  w^as  a  gifted  creature,  and 
most  generous  to  poor  authors,  for  whom  he  drew  many 
a  check. 

He  was  afterwards  minister  to  Turkey,  and  to  Rus- 
sia, where  he  distinguished  himself,  and  I  know  no  man 
who  seemed  to  me  to  have  led  more  nobly  the  dual  life 
of  man  of  the  world  and  man  of  the  library.  He  had 
a  beautiful  head  and  the  manners  of  Lord  Chester- 
field. 

The  venerable  George  Calvert,  the  real  Lord  Balti- 
more, was  one  of  the  ornaments  of  the  JSTewport  of  that 
day.  He  was  in  some  way  a  descendant  (through  the 
distaff  side)  of  Rubens,  and  said  that  he  owed  his  "  lit- 
tle independence"  to  him.  He  owned  some  of  his 
pictures.  He  was  a  sweet  and  gifted  personage,  who 
wrote  some  very  attractive  books.  I  used  every  sum- 
mer at  Newport  to  take  tea  with  him  and  his  lovely 
wife.  It  was  a  glimpse  of  the  past  like  to  a  whiff  of 
rose  potpourri.  What  treasures  of  anecdote  that  life 
of  ninety  years  held !  And  he  appropriately  wrote  his 
own  biography  in  a  book  called  A  Gentleman. 

Miss  Jane  Stuart,  daughter  of  the  painter  Gilbert 


THE   GORGEOUS   VANDEEBILT   HOUSES  195 

Stuart,  painted  my  picture  at  this  time.  She  asked  me 
to  sit  to  her,  and  I  gladly  accepted  the  opportunity  to 
hear  her  talk  of  her  father.  Her  conversations  I  wrote 
down  and  have  them  yet.  It  was  a  very  badly  drawn 
picture,  but  she  gave  it  to  me,  asking  that  she  might 
keep  it  during  her  life.  When  I  returned  from  Europe 
it  had  passed  into  other  hands,  and  I  have  never  recov- 
ered it;  but  I  have  the  memory  of  a  very  queer,  de- 
lightful old  lady  left. 

I  quote  from  my  journal,  February,  1889,  of  the  gay 
season  which  preceded  Lent,  to  mark  the  contrast  be- 
tween that  year  and  another  season  of — well,  we  will 
say  twenty  years  before.  In  that  time  the  gorgeous 
palaces  of  the  Yanderbilts  had  been  built ;  Mr.  W.  H. 
Yanderbilt  was  founding  his  superb  gallery,  and  his  son 
Cornelius  had  just  opened  the  beautiful  house  at  the 
corner  of  Fifty-seventh  Street  and  Fifth  Avenue.  I  re- 
member their  first  house-warming  in  this  new  chateau- 
like house,  in  which  orchids  filled  the  fireplace  and  chim- 
ney-piece, simulating  a  veritable  fire.  But  perhaps  the 
most  unique  and  rare  entertainment  given  by  Mrs.  Cor- 
nelius Yanderbilt  was  in  the  hiring  of  Coquelin  to  en- 
tertain the  Thursday  Evening  Club.  Pie  and  his  son, 
then  a  nice-looking  boy,  presented  one  scene  of  a  play, 
Le  Mariage  Force.  The  great  actor  himself  recited 
several  pieces.  It  was  a  party  which  recalled  the  pict- 
ure of  Louis  XIY.  supping  with  Moliere.  A  gorgeous 
supper  followed,  society  was  at  its  very  best,  and  Herr 
Kalisch  sang. 

Again,  Mrs.  Henry  Yillard,  in  the  picturesque  Tiffany 
Flats,  entertained  the  Drawing-Eoom  Club,  with  Edison 
and  his  phonograph,  songs  from  Lilli  Lehmann,  with 
Bergner  and  Bendix  on  violin  and  cello.  These  artists 
sang  and  played  into  the  phonograph,  and  realized  Mun- 


196  AN    EPISTLE    TO    POSTERITY 

chausen's  wild  tale  of  the  music  frozen  up  in  the  trum- 
pet. Madame  Lehmann  looked  handsome  in  her  dress 
brocaded  with  pearls.  With  Koyal  orders  across  her 
ample  corsage,  she  seemed  the  genius  of  Wagner's 
music. 

Then  there  was  a  remarkable  sale  of  pictures  at  Chick- 
ering  Hall :  Corots,  Daubignys,  a  charming  Diaz,  a  fine 
Detaille,  and  a  splendid  Verboeckhoven — rather  good 
for  a  republican  city  in  one  month. 

And,  mixed  in  with  this  conglomeration,  a  large  party 
of  Eoman  Catholic  pilgrims  left  for  Eome  and  the  Holy 
Land,  bound  on  a  religious  pilgrimage,  after  the  fashion 
of  the  eleventh  century.  We  thought  of  reviving  the 
Crusades  in  order  to  have  a  little  change ! 

Just  then  society  left  for  Washington  to  attend  the 
inauguration  of  General  Harrison.  One  rich  New-Yorker 
paid  $500  a  week  for  a  house. 

The  weather  was  very  cold,  and  I  started  on  a  round 
of  visits  from  Washington  Square  to  Eighty -ninth 
Street. 

After  taking  a  journey  almost  like  going  to  Washing- 
ton, I  arrived  at  a  beautiful  city,  which  I  had  never 
seen  before  (all  had  been  empty  lots  a  few  years  be- 
fore), and  found  myself  in  a  very  handsome  house; 
my  hostess  in  primrose  crepe,  with  a  bunch  of  yellow 
roses  in  her  hand.  It  was  summer  and  spring  combined, 
while  without  the  thermometer  marked  ten  degrees  be- 
low zero. 

Such  are  the  surprises  of  this  city  of  Aladdin,  this 
wonderful  reward  of  energy  and  the  industry  of  a  new 
world. 

Unfortunately,  the  American  builds  his  palace,  fills  it 
with  the  triumphs  of  art,  the  ivory  and  gold  of  Samar- 
.kand,  the  infinite  dreams  of  the  Japanese  and  the  Arab ; 


THE   GOSSIP   OF   SOCIETY  197 

he  lines  it  with  American  comforts ;  he  puts  his  beauti- 
ful wife  in  a  rose-colored  boudoir  and  gives  her  all  the 
luxury  of  a  queen ;  she  drives  the  best  horses  and 
gives  the  best  of  dinners,  and  hears  all  the  artists  in 
the  world  sing.  And  then  they  both  conclude  that 
they  are  bored,  and  they  lock  up  all  this  luxury,  go 
off  to  London  or  Kome  or  Paris,  and  live  contentedly 
in  a  very  inferior  apartment,  and  are  apparently  en- 
tirely content. 

It  was  somewhere  in  the  'TO's  that  the  fiend  gos- 
sip came  into  New  York  society  to  stay.  The  first 
newspaper  outburst  that  I  remember  was  after  the 
Beecher  trial,  which  was  a  terrible  beginning.  Then 
the  papers  began  with  attacks  upon  women.  There 
were  stories  of  kleptomaniacs,  and  of  a  young  and  fash- 
ionable man  who  had  stolen  his  cousin's  ring  at  a  din- 
ner-party, etc.,  etc.  None  of  this  sort  of  story  was  al- 
lowed at  the  dinners  of  Mrs.  Astor,  Mrs.  Belmont,  or 
Mrs.  Fish.  I  can  imagine  the  fine  face  of  the  latter 
freezing  into  marble  had  any  one  opened  such  a  door  of 
Bluebeard's  closet  in  her  stately  presence. 

Society  had  to  sustain  some  shocks,  no  doubt,  in  those 
days.  Human  nature  was  still  human  nature,  but  there 
was  not  added  on  the  "  might,  should,  or  could  be " 
tense  as  now.  Every  one  was  considered  innocent  until 
he  was  proved  to  be  guilty.  Now  gossip  makes  every 
3^oung  and  pretty  person  guilty  unless  she  is  proved  to 
be  innocent.  This  habit  of  free  speaking  at  ladies' 
lunches  has  impaired  society ;  it  has  doubtless  led  to 
many  of  the  tragedies  of  divorce  and  marital  unhappi- 
ness.  Could  society  be  deaf  and  dumb  and  Congress 
abolished  for  a  season,  what  a  happy  and  peaceful  life 
one  could  lead  ! 

"  Censorious  world,  madame !  censorious  world !"  as 


198  AN    EPISTLE   TO    POSTEEITY 

Mephistopheles  says  in  the  play  to  the  old  woman. 
But  it  is  not  worthy  the  title  of  the  old  Roman  "  Cen- 
sor." It  is  idle  tittle-tattle,  sound  and  fury,  signifying 
nothing.  Therefore  I  have  purposely  abstained  from 
retailing,  from  the  vast  stores  at  my  command,  the 
piquant  stories  of  ]^ew  York  fashionable  life,  of  which 
I  know,  alas !  too  many.  Posterity  will  not  need  them ; 
it  is  better  off  without  them. 

I  do  not  believe  that  New  York  has  been  a  bad  or  a 
dissolute  city ;  I  think  it  has  had  the  folly  to  wish  to 
appear  so  occasionall}'^,  and  I  think  that  gossip  has  done 
the  rest.  Eminent  and  beautiful  lives,  most  charming 
and  happy  households,  have  held  their  own  here,  in  spite 
of  luxury  and  fashion.  And  what  a  small  part  of  any 
city  is  any  so-called  fashionable  circle !  To  be  sure,  all 
that  is  conspicuous  is  important,  for  all  eyes  are  fixed 
on  that  circle ;  but  its  changeful  character  is  the  safe- 
guard against  bad  examples. 

When  Posterity  reads,  as  it  doubtless  will,  our  causes 
celebres  —  our  buried  newspapers  —  it  will  be  apt  to 
think  that  we  were  very  wicked,  that  the  men's  clubs 
were  instituted  to  take  away  the  characters  of  women, 
that  society  Avas  only  another  name  for  a  black  eye. 
But  that  was  not  so.  New  York  at  the  end  of  the 
nineteenth  century  was  neither  Sodom  nor  Gomor- 
rah. 

Little  children  tripped  by  to  school  and  went  home  to 
happy  young  mothers.  The  opera  and  the  theatre  were 
filled  with  handsome,  beautiful,  well-to-do  people;  the 
art-galleries  and  museums  were  thronged  with  eager 
learners ;  and,  better  than  all,  Sunday  was  a  quiet  day, 
consecrated  to  religious  observances.  The  scene  in  the 
hundreds  of  churches  in  New  York  told  the  story  of  a 
Christian  and  a  law-loving  people.    The  unfinished  sky- 


PHILANTHROPY   OF   FASHIONABLE   PEOPLE  199 

scrapers,  the  holes  in  Fifth  Avenue,  are  only  unfinished 
jobs,  dear  Posterity,  not  the  prisons  under  the  Neva  or 
the  pioinbi  of  Venice !  There  may  have  been  a  few 
cases  of  unjust  imprisonment,  but  the  Tombs  was  visit- 
ed daily  by  religious  and  charitable  women.  Judge  us 
lightly.  Posterity.  We  might  have  been  better,  but  we 
might  also  have  been  infinitely  worse.  And  had  it  not 
been  for  the  mistaken  representation  of  many  a  well- 
known  circumstance,  through  the  work  of  the  fiend  gossip, 
society  would  have  been  more  dignified  and  more  secure 
than  it  is.  It  seems  impossible,  when  one  is  travelling 
in  Europe  and  away  from  it  all,  or  when  buried  in  the 
delicious  seclusion  of  a  library,  that  such  improbable 
stories  can  have  any  interest  for  reasonable  people,  and 
yet  no  one  can  hear  them  perpetually  without  being  in- 
terested and  "  believing  something." 

Therefore,  so  far  as  this  poor  little  Epistle  is  concerned, 
I  will  not  put  in  one  word  of  gossip,  not  even  in  a  post- 
script, believing,  dear  Posterity,  that  you  will  have  bet- 
ter reading  than  that.  But  I  will  bear  most  grateful 
testimony  to  the  philanthropy  and  the  generous  giving 
to  all  good  objects  of  the  fashionable  people  of  my  day 
in  ]^ew  York.  It  was  from  the  very  highest  circles 
of  the  most  conspicuous  fashion  that  the  money  was 
raised  for  the  Nursery  and  Child's  Hospital,  and  for  the 
Woman's  Hospital ;  and  many  will  remember  with  grati- 
tude the  noble  benefaction  of  Mrs.  George  W.  CuUum, 
who,  stricken  by  the  fell  disease  herself,  founded  the 
Cancer  Hospital,  the  grandest  of  all;  the  contributions 
of  the  Yanderbilt  family  to  the  Medical  Science  of  the 
day,  giving  millions  at  a  time;  Mr.  Peter  Cooper's 
foundation  of  the  Cooper  Union ;  and  the  almost  un- 
paralleled munificence  of  Mr.  J.  Pierpont  Morgan,  tes- 
tify that  worldly -success  does  not  harden  the  heart, 


200  AN   EPISTLE   TO   POSTEEITY 

but  that  these  kind  hearts  consider  wealth  as  a  trust. 
The  visits  of  the  foremost  young  daughters  of  fashion 
to  the  poor,  the  sick,  and  the  prisoners  have  also  the 
deepest  significance,  and  these  are  the  glories  of  ISTew 
York. 


CHAPTER  Xn 

Second  Visit  to  London — A  Day  in  the  House  of  Commons — London 
in  1886 — The  Ascot  Races  and  Dr.  Holmes — My  Presentation  at 
Court  and  a  State  Ball  at  Buckingham  Palace — A  Supper  with 
Irving  at  the  Beefsteak  Club  —  Mr.  Gladstone  and  the  Chapel 
Royal  —  A  Dinner  with  Sir  John  Millais  —  Mr.  Browning,  Sir 
Frederic  Leighton,  Mrs.  Procter,  and  Du  Maurier. 

When  I  went  to  England  in  1884,  after  an  interval 
of  many  years,  I  found  London  a  different  place.  It 
seemed  twice  as  large,  and  the  trouble  was  where  to  be- 
gin. Fortunately  for  me,  Mr.  Lowell  was  our  minister, 
and,  as  an  old  friend,  he  was  certain  to  do  all  that  he 
could.  His  second  wife,  although  an  invalid,  came  to 
take  me  to  drive,  and  invited  me  to  her  receptions,  and 
did  all  for  me  that  an  invalid  could  do.  When  I  showed 
her  my  letters  she  told  me  that  I  would  find  the  liter- 
ary celebrities  the  hardest  to  meet,  which  indeed  was 
the  case;  but  she  added,  "Mr.  Lowell  and  Mr.  Hoppin 
will  help  you."  Mr.  W.  J.  Hoppin  was  the  Secretary 
of  Legation,  and  most  popular  and  agreeable.  I  need 
not  say  what  Mr.  Lowell  was;  no  man  ever  enjoyed 
a  greater  share  of  England's  homage  than  he  did. 
Through  my  letters  and  through  him  I  became  ac- 
quainted with  Edmund  Gosse,  Sir  Frederic  Leighton, 
Andrew  Lang,  Walter  Herries  Pollock,  Mrs.  E.  Lynn  Lin- 
ton, Mr.  Anstey  (author  of  Vice  Versa),  and  at  the  house 
of  our  countryman,  James  McHenr}^  I  found  the  ope7i 
sesame  to  Holland  House.  Mr.  Lowell  introduced  me 
to  Mrs.  Procter, "  Barry  Cornwall's"  widow,  who  indeed 


203  AN   EPISTLE   TO   POSTERITY 

had  a  literary  belonging  almost  impossible  to  measure. 
This  admirable  and  interesting  woman  admitted  me  to 
something  like  intimacy,  and  I  enjoyed  nothing  so  mucii 
in  all  England  as  her  conversation. 

I  had  in  this  summer  of  1884  many  opportunities  to 
hear  the  discussions  in  the  House  of  Commons,  at  Mr. 
Lowell's  request.  Through  the  courtesy  of  Mrs.  Peel,  wife 
of  the  Speaker,  I  was  admitted  often  to  her  seat  in  the 
Speaker's  Gallery,  a  little  wired-off  uncomfortable  place. 
I  remember  the  last  day  of  the  session  before  the  Whit- 
suntide recess.  I  heard  Mr.  Gladstone  make  a  long  and 
important  speech.  I  heard  Mr.  Trevelyan,  Lord  Ran- 
dolph Churchill,  Mr.  Labouchere,  Ashmead  -  Bartlett, 
Mr.  O'Donnell,  Mr.  Parnell,  Baron  Worms,  and  several 
others.  The  attacks  were  upon  Mr.  Gladstone  for  not 
reinforcing  Gordon.  They  were  most  bitter,  but  he  re- 
pelled them  with  a  grave  indifference.  When  later  on, 
in  Rome,  I  heard  of  Gordon's  death,  how  well  I  remem- 
bered that  debate !  I  certainly  could  not  have  chosen  a 
better  season  in  which  to  hear  the  combined  wit  and 
wisdom  of  the  House  of  Commons.  Mr.  Ashmead-Bart- 
lett  had  a  fluent  and  glib  utterance.  Mr.  O'Donnell  was 
fiery  and  inconsequent ;  Lord  Randolph  Churchill  was 
very  brilliant  and  severe.  Mr.  Labouchere  is  a  clear, 
fluent  speaker,  as  is  also  Mr.  Trevelyan.  Mr.  Gladstone 
is  one  of  the  orators  of  the  world,  very  like  Wendell 
Phillips,  who  was  the  prince  of  orators.  I  do  not  dislike 
the  reserve  of  English  speech,  and  I  must  make  my  com- 
pliment to  the  Prince  of  Wales,  a  most  graceful  and  easy 
speaker.  I  heard  him  later  on  at  the  reception  of  Austra- 
lian gentlemen  at  the  "Heatheries,"  and  very  often  since. 

I  heard  a  great  deal  of  reading  and  reciting  in  Eng- 
lish salons.  That  reading  which  as  girls  we  used  to  do, 
in  country-houses,  of  favorite  poems  was  done  in  superb 


PRIVATE   THEATRICALS   IN    LONDON  203 

salons  by  experienced  declaimers.  I  sat  by  Browning's 
side  twice  as  a  woman  with  a  fine  voice  recited  Herve 
Riel  and  IIoio  they  Brought  the  Good  JVews  from  Ghent 
to  Aix.  I  asked  him  if  it  pleased  him.  He  said,  "  Yes, 
I  am  mortal,  but  I  like  a  foretaste  of  immortality."  He 
said  the  prettiest  verse  that  Longfellow  had  ever  written 
was: 

"Then  choose  from  the  favored  volume 
The  poem  of  thy  choice, 
And  add  to  the  rhyme  of -the  poet 
The  music  of  thy  voice." 

It  seemed  as  if  society  were  returning  again  to  that 
golden  age  when  Tasso  read  his  sonnets  before  the  Duke 
d'Este ;  when  Petrarch,  stretched  upon  the  grass,  poured 
forth  his  thoughts  to  Laura  (she  in  her  green  gown 
embroidered  with  violets). 

Among  other  intellectual  amusements  was  the  rage 
for  private  theatricals,  in  w^hich  the  Hon.  Claude  Pon- 
sonby  took  a  leading  part,  as  did  Mr.  Hamilton  Aide, 
and  I  saw  one  of  Lady  Archibald  Campbell's  reproduc- 
tions of  As  You  Like  It.  These  were  all  remarkably 
well  done.  I  also  saw  the  mask  of  Comus  at  the  Tem- 
ple Church  and  Court,  Princess  Louise  being  the  especial 
guest,  as  she  is  an  honorary  barrister  and  a  member  of 
the  Temple. 

I  made  an  exhaustive  study  of  old  London,  going  to 
the  Tower,  to  the  Charterhouse,  where  poor  Colonel 
Newcome  said  "  Adsum"  ;  also  to  I^ewgate,  the  seven 
churches  of  Christopher  Wren,  Lambeth  Palace,  and  the 
oldest  houses  I  could  find.  This  was  most  insti*uctive 
and  delightful.  I  advise  all  travellers  to  buy  a  Bae- 
de'ker's  Guide  and  to  go  over  London  in  this  w^ay. 

London  was  beautiful  in  June,  in  all  the  pride  of  the 
season.     At  the  Buckino^bam  Palace  Hotel  we  were  sa- 


^04  AN   EPISTLE   TO    POSTERITY 

luted  daily  by  the  Queen's  Highlanders  playing  the  bag- 
pipes, as  th«  scarlet  soldiers  marched  to  guard  mounting 
at  St.  James's  fine  old  historical  palace.  This  is  of  itself 
worth  coming  to  London  for.  And  I  went  to  see  the 
"  coaches,"  a  royal  display  with  Lord  Charles  Beresford 
and  the  Prince  of  Wales  on  the  box,  two  very  popular  men. 

It  takes  a  cultivated  nerve  to  bear  the  crowd  in  Pic- 
cadilly, and  to  be  out  through  such  a  scene  as  this  is  a 
trial.  My  hostess  was  a  marchioness  herself,  one  of  the 
handsome  gay  "  swells,"  and  she  told  me  who  everybody 
w^as.  I  thought  the  mixed  liveries  presented  an  incon- 
gruous appearance,  and  told  her  I  liked  better  the  full 
figure  of  a  coachman,  wig  and  knee-breeches,  which  was 
the  fashion  when  I  had  first  seen  London.  Now  the 
glory  of  "  Jeems  Yellowplush  "  and  of  the  red  breeches 
seems  to  be  dulled.  Certainly  if  one  flunky  is  pow- 
dered they  should  all  be  powdered.  She  told  me  I  was 
too  exigeant,  that  I  wanted  all  of  old  London  and  new 
London ;  but,  indeed,  I  might  well  have  been  satisfied, 
for  it  was  a  brilliant  day. 

I  went  to  some  small  lunches  in  this  visit,  saw  the 
Prince  and  Princess  of  Wales  go  by  often,  and  I  gazed 
upon  many  of  the  great  beauties.  I  went  to  the  open- 
in  «•  of  sralleries  and  museums,  and  heard  the  Prince  make 
many  a  speech,  which  he  did  very  well.  I  also  heard 
the  Duke  of  Westminster,  Sir  Coutts  Lindsay,  the  Mar- 
quis of  Hartington,  Clifford  Greville,  and  Professor 
Tyndall  make  excellent  speeches  on  the  subject  of  Sunday 
opening,  for  the  poor,  of  all  the  galleries  and  museums 
of  London.  Indeed,  the  Duke  of  Westminster  promised 
to  throw  open  the  galleries  of  Grosvenor  House,  with 
its  priceless  treasures  of  paintings  and  other  works  of 
art,  for  this  worthy  purpose. 

London  is  far  ahead  of  us  in  this  matter  of  giving  to 


FIRST   VISIT   TO   WINDSOR  205 

the  poor  agreeable  Sunday  afternoons.  I  wish  that  we 
could  emulate  this  noble  and  wise  generosity. 

I  was  admitted  by  the  card  of  the  Hon.  Mrs.  TVelles- 
ley  to  see  the  splendid  collection  of  pictures  at  Gros- 
venor  House.  How  well  I  remember  the  "  Blue  Boy  " 
of  Sir  Joshua,  and  the  empty  space  where  had  hung 
Mr.  Gladstone's  picture,  recently  taken  down,  owing  to 
the  famous  quarrel  of  the  Duke  of  Westminster  with 
Mr.  Gladstone.  The  outlook  from  the  windows  of  Gros- 
venor  House  into  a  delightful  private  park  was  most  ex- 
quisite. This  gallery  and  that  of  Sir  Eichard  Wallace 
were  very  diJBficult  to  see,  requiring  private  influence; 
but  they  well  repaid  all  the  effort.  In  my  case,  fortu- 
natel}^,  it  came  easily.  I  suppose  the  collection  of  Sir 
Richard  Wallace  was  as  choice  and  rich,  particularly  in 
examples  of  the  Dutch  school,  as  any  in  London. 

And  I  paid  a  visit  to  a  friend  who  had  a  lovely  cottage 
at  Ascot,  that  royal  suburb.  It  was  a  most  charming 
experience  of  the  spring  in  England,  and  most  interest- 
ing, to  see  the  woods  full  of  primroses,  and  the  loyal 
Tory  ladies  plucking  them  in  honor  of  Beaconsfield,  who 
had  died  in  1881. 

The  court  was  in  mourning  for  the  Queen's  youngest 
son,  but  we  saw  the  castle  as  it  is  shown  to  strangers. 

We  drove  to  Windsor,  in  which  royal  town  my  hostess 
bought  her  green  groceries,  under  the  very  shadow  of 
that  feudal  fortress,  that  royal  residence,  which  covers 
fifty  acres  of  ground  with  its  splendid  stone-work.  E"o 
palace  in  this* world  has  ever  impressed  me  like  Wind- 
sor, and  I  have  seen  nearly  all  the  greatest  and  most 
royal  ones.  The  scarlet  sentinels  stood  by  its  open  gate. 
As  I  looked  up  at  its  towering  grandeur  a  few  soldiers 
rode  out ;  then  came  a  carriage  with  four  outriders ;  in 
it  was  the  Queen  in  deep  mourning,  with  some  of  the 


206  AN   EPISTLE   TO   POSTERITY 

young  princesses  of  Hesse.  I  saw  her  again  and  again 
in  the  beautiful  park  under  the  Queen  Anne  elms,  two 
equerries  and  a  groom  galloping  after  the  carriage. 
Then  we  drove  to  Eton,  and  saw  all  the  bright  boys 
wearing  mourning  for  their  fellow-student  the  Duke  of 
Albany.     The  Queen  is  very  fond  of  the  Eton  boys. 

They  wore  round  jackets,  broad  collars,  high  hats — 
the  dear  lads — with  English  pink  and  white  on  their 
healthy  cheeks.  I  went  into  the  church,  paused  before 
the  statue  or  the  efRgy  of  the  founder,  Henry  YI.,  and 
read  on  the  walls  the  stories  of  great  Etonians.  When 
you  read  these  histories  of  England's  past  you  wonder 
that  there  can  be  an  ignoble  Englishman. 

After  Ascot  I  paid  other  visits  to  friends  in  the  coun- 
try, going  down  to  the  neighborhood  of  Charles  Kings- 
ley's  former  home  at  Eversley.  My  hostess  was  kind 
enough  to  drive  me  to  his  church  and  grave — we  found 
his  memorial  stone  hung  with  ivy — a  lovely  and  most 
picturesque  old  church  and  rectory,  all  rendered  dear 
by  the  memory  of  a  man  who  had  done  so  much  for 
literature,  and  whom  I  had  seen  on  his  last  visit  to 
New  York,  at  Mrs.  Botta's. 

In  1886  I  went  to  London  again.  I  have  since  be- 
lieved that  that  season  of  1886  was  one  of  unusual  brill- 
iancy. It  was  the  one  before  the  Jubilee,  and  perhaps 
the  Queen  had  been  reminded  that  she  had  better  show 
Iierself  and  appeal  to  her  great  personal  popularity. 
People  feared  riots,  mobs,  and  dynamite.  Mr.  Glad- 
stone had  been  pushing  things  in  the  House.  Every- 
body felt  poor.  The  best  houses  all  over  London  were 
to  let.  Perhaps  the  court  made  unusual  efforts  to 
be  gay.  The  grand  Indian  Colonial  Exhibition  was 
crowded,  and  the  cabinet  entertained  perpetually.  Had 
I  not  seen  London  the  next  year  in  its  unexampled 


ROYAL   ASCOT  307 

brilliancy  I  should  have  remembered  some  Tintoretto 
pictures  better  than  I  do. 

A  second  visit  to  Ascot  found  us  driving  over  to  see 
the  Royal  Military  College  at  Sandhurst.  The  cadets 
were  unmercifully  severe  on  Mr.  Gladstone,  who  just 
then  was  takino^  that  abuse  which  has  ao^reed  with  him 
so  well.  I  remember  that  Sir  Arthur  Sullivan  came,  and 
that  we  laughed  and  talked  together.  While  I  was  won- 
dering that  they  were  allowed  to  lampoon  Gladstone, 
and  have  a  ludicrous  figure  of  him  on  horseback,  he  re- 
minded me  that  his  great  rival,  Disraeli,  had  met  with 
even  greater  abuse  in  1868 ;  in  fact,  that  he  began  what 
was  to  be  his  illustrious  career  under  a  cloud  of  scurri- 
lous criticism.   "  It  does  not  hurt  them,"  said  Sir  Arthur. 

My  third  season  in  London  held  another  visit  to  Ascot. 
I  saw  Ormonde  win  the  race  over  the  late  winner  of  the 
Derby — a  great  event.  This  royal  race  at  Ascot  on  a 
famous  day  is  a  most  splendid  affair.  The  Prince  of 
"Wales  opens  it  in  state,  and  the  royal  huntsman  in  green 
precedes  the  glittering  cortege  down  the  long  course ;  and 
all  the  royalties,  in  gay  carriages,  go  in  a  procession  for 
all  the  world  to  see.  The  magnificent  stride  of  Ormonde 
reminded  me  of  the  Latin  line  '^  Quadrupedante  jputrem 
sonitu  quatit  ungula  camjpum^'*  as  he  shook  the  earth. 

All  the  fashion  of  England  was  there.  We  were  on 
top  of  a  coach,  where  we  lunched,  and  the  whole  day 
was  as  brilliant  as  possible.  The  princesses  were  on 
the  ground  and  were  much  interested.  The  Princess 
of  Wales,  remarkably  beautiful  and  most  gracious,  Avas 
present,  and  our  own  Dr.  Holmes  was  in  the  royal  en- 
closure. I  had  the  honor  of  dining  with  him  later  at 
Mr.  Phelps's,  with  Sir  W.  Yernon  Harcourt  and  Lady 
Harcourt,  Chief-Justice  Herschell  and  Lady  Herschell, 
Lady  Cottenham,  Mr.  Browning,  Mr.  Irving,  Mr.  Story, 


208  AN   EPISTLE   TO   POSTERITY 

and  Mr.  Lowell,  and  others  whom  I  have  forgotten — 
certainly  a  red-letter  day.  The  witty  little  doctor,  full 
of  fun,  told  us  of  his  having  lost  his  bets,  and  was  also 
kind  enough  to  tell  us  of  his  last  visit — I  think  fifty  years 
before — to  the  races. 

His  reception  in  London  was  a  thing  to  see.  I  went 
to  the  great  party  he  gave  to  return  his  many  invitations. 
Mr.  Browning  stood  by  my  side  and  told  me  the  names 
of  the  celebrities,  one  of  whom  was  the  Lord  Mayor, 
with  a  beautiful  diamond  pendant  hanging  from  his  neck ; 
and  Mr.  Cavendish,  who  might  have  been  Duke  of  Devon- 
shire. Another  was  Dinah  Maria  Mulock  Craik,  the 
author  of  John  Halifax^  Gentleman^  with  whom  I  af- 
terwards talked.  I  asked  the  doctor  how  he  liked  all 
this  adoration.  "  Oh,"  said  he,  "  I  am  asphyxiated  with 
it."  He  and  his  daughter  received,  I  suppose,  one  of 
the  most  thorough  ovations  ever  paid  to  Americans. 

It  was  in  this  fortunate  summer  of  1886  that  Mr. 
Phelps  did  me  the  honor  to  present  me  at  court.  My 
presentation  came  on  a  cold  Thursday  in  April,  and  I 
had  to  be  dressed  at  ten  in  the  morning  in  *'  evening 
dress — a  long  train,  three  yards  wide  and  four  long, 
white  feathers  and  white  veil,  white  gloves  and  shoes." 
Such  is  the  order  issued  by  the  Lord  Chamberlain. 

The  afternoon  before,  I  had  received  an  invitation  from 
Mrs.  Wellesley  to  take  tea  with  her,  to  meet,  as  she  said, 
"  some  of  her  gossips."  I  went  gladly,  for  I  knew  all 
Mrs.  Wellesley's  gossips  were  worth  meeting. 

I  saw  a  carriage  at  the  door  with  the  royal  liveries, 
and  on  entering  was  presented  to  a  quiet  little  lady, 
Princess  Christian. 

She  was  delightful,  cordial,  and  was  very  much  amused 
that  I  dreaded  the  effect  of  my  courtesy.  She  said, 
"  Oh,  it  is  only  the  charity  bob,  made  with  respectful 


MY    PRESENTATION   AT   COUET  309 

intent ";  and  that  is  the  best  description  I  have  ever  heard 
of  it.  After  giving  me  some  good  advice,  such  as  to  re- 
tain something  to  throw  over  my  shoulders,  as  I  might 
have  to  wait  long  in  the  anteroom,  where  to  leave  my 
cloak,  etc.,  she  said,  "I  am  sorry  you  will  not  see  my 
mother  to-morrow,  as  she  is  quite  ill;  the  Princess  of 
Wales  receives  for  her,  and  I  shall  be  there ;  however, 
you  will  see  the  Queen  later  on."  She  was  so  gentle, 
amiable,  and  funny,  and  laughed  so  naturally  and  agree- 
ablv,  that  I  forgot  that  she  was  a  princess. 

The  next  day,  when  I  passed  the  royal  group,  she 
gave  me  a  kind  and  familiar  recognition,  which  did 
much  to  redeem  the  somewhat  trying  and  cold  function 
of  being  presented.  I  courtesied  also  to  the  Prince  of 
Wales,  who  stood  at  the  end  of  the  group  with  his 
good-natured  smile. 

I  had  remembered  the  instructions  of  the  gracious 
Princess  as  to  retaining  a  wrap,  which  was  most  grate- 
ful as  I  sat  in  a  cold  drawing-room  with  a  few  friends 
before  my  turn  came  to  go  through  the  narrow  turn- 
stile. I  heard  my  name  called,  I  followed  a  long  line 
of  ladies,  heard  the  page  say,  '^  Your  train,  madame." 
It  was  thrown  over  my  arm,  and  I  rejoined  Mrs.  Phelps. 
At  first  this  train  seems  ridiculously  like  private  theat- 
ricals, but  when  once  in  the  grand  rooms  of  Bucking- 
ham Palace,  with  a  hundred  others,  you  see  that  the 
dress  is  very  stately,  and  that  in  a  crowd  it  is  becom- 
ing and  fit.  I  was  in  my  coupe  at  eleven  en  route  for 
the  palace,  my  big  train  wrapped  around  me  for  a 
cloak,  and,  indeed,  I  needed  it,  for  it  was  cold  and  rainy. 

I  spent  a  most  agreeable  hour  after  the  presentation 
chatting  with  friends,  one  of  whom  assured  me  that  it 
was  worth  all  the  trouble  and  fatigue,  "for,"  said  she, 
"you  are  now  eligible  to  all  the  court  functions." 


210  AN   EPISTLE   TO   POSTERITY 

And  at  two  o'clock,  the  whole  dreaded  ceremony 
being  over,  I  was  again  in  my  coupe  in  the  quadrangle 
of  the  palace,  where  the  guards  sat  on  their  splendid 
horses  motionless,  as  when  I  went  in,  all  of  them  wet 
to  the  skin,  for  it  rained  heavily.  The  drive  to  Mr. 
Phelps's,  in  Lowndes  Square,  was  soon  accomplished, 
and  a  hot  cup  of  tea  was  very  gratefully  swallowed. 

An  invitation  to  the  court  ball  followed  this  cere- 
mon}^,  and  that  was  worth  seeing. 

Buckingham  Palace  is  not  a  home — it  is  used  prin- 
cipally for  these  ceremonies;  therefore  on  the  day  of 
the  presentation  it  had  looked  cold  and  dreary,  but  on 
the  evening  of  the  ball  it  was  palatial,  grand,  and  splen- 
did. The  lights,  the  flowers,  the  music,  the  pompous 
rows  of  servants,  and  the  gentlemen  in  waiting  in  full 
uniforms — all  was  beautiful. 

The  Englishwoman  is  always  handsome  on  horse- 
back and  in  evening  dress.  She  wears  at  the  court 
ball  all  her  jewels,  that  necklace  of  diamonds,  which  is 
perhaps  so  valuable  that  it  is  entailed  from  father  to 
son — that  "  Sevigne"  of  diamonds  which  falls  down  her 
bodice  like  a  stream  of  trickling  water.  Every  wom- 
an is  in  a  low-necked  and  sleeveless  dress,  showing 
that  neck  of  unrivalled  fairness  which  betrays  the 
Saxon  blood.  Superb,  proud,  handsome  creatures  they 
look,  with  that  noted  carriage  of  the  head  which  we 
call  aristocratic.  Mrs.  Phelps,  with  her  usual  marked 
kindness,  had  given  me  permission  to  enter  with  the 
diplomatic  corps,  which  saved  me  much  waiting  and 
fatigue,  and  led  me  through  some  long,  low  galleries 
filled  with  interesting  old  pictures  of  George  II.  and 
George  III.  and  their  families.  How  I  longed  to  stop 
and  examine  them ;  but  I  could  not.  I  had  two  young 
ladies  who  were  spoiling  for  a  dance ;  so  we  deposited 


A   STATE    BALL   AT   BUCKINGHAM   PALACE  211 

our  wraps  in  a  rather  dim  chamber  and  then  began  to 
find  our  way  through  a  long,  serpentine,  circuitous 
route  to  the  ballroom.  The  grand  staircase  was  massed 
with  flowers,  principally  geraniums  and  garden  flowers, 
for  even  royalty  does  not  use  such  flowers  as  we  dis- 
play at  our  every-day  dinners.  ]^o  people  boast  such 
hot-house  flowers  as  w^e  reckless  Americans.  But  on 
entering  the  ballroom  we  reached  a  saturnalia  of  color. 
The  diplomatic  corps  were  grouped  on  the  right  of  the 
throne,  an  array  of  superb  court  dresses.  The  every-day 
aspect  of  a  diplomatic  corps  is  magnificent ;  what,  then, 
was  it  w^hen  enriched  by  the  Indian,  Egyptian,  Austra- 
lian, African,  and  Chinese  dresses  of  the  magnates, 
sent  by  all  the  colonists  to  the  Colonial  Exhibition. 
There  was  one  little  man  in  green  (I  thought  he  looked 
like  an  alligator)  who  was  all  sewn  with  uncut  dia,- 
monds.  I  believe  he  was  a  Persian.  Then  there  were 
the  great  soldiers  with  all  their  orders  and  medals,  the 
admirals,  the  foreign  princes  and  counts,  and  so  on. 

On  the  left — my  left,  but  the  throne's  right — were 
the  duchesses,  a  tiara  of  grandeur ;  then  the  dukes,  all 
dressed,  as  was  every  man  present,  in  court  dress. 
This  means,  of  course,  white  silk  stockings,  knee- 
breeches,  low  shoes,  and  an  embroidered  velvet  coat, 
orders  and  jewels,  lace  at  the  neck  and  wrists,  and  a 
sworcl.  The  plainest  dress  allowed  is  that  which  Amer- 
ican citizens  wear,  made  of  black  velvet.  The  great 
Highland  chieftain,  the  Duke  of  Athole,  was  splendid  in 
his  tartan,  a  full,  perfect  Highland  dress,  with  his  skene- 
dhu  stuck  in  his  stocking,  perhaps  for  immediate  use 
upon  the  "  Sassenach."  However,  the  Prince  of  Wales 
is  very  fond  of  him,  and  especially  of  this  dress,  and  so 
there  was  no  blood  shed.  The  old  Duke  of  Northum- 
berland, with  the  blood  of  Harry  Hotspur  in  his  veins, 


213  AN    EPISTLE   TO   POSTERITY 

was  superb  in  a  green  velvet  coat  and  white  knee- 
breeches.  But  eleven  o'clock  came,  and  royalty,  al- 
ways punctual,  began  to  enter.  Through  the  door 
near  which  stood  the  diplomatic  corps  they  came. 

First,  the  lords  and  gentlemen  in  waiting ;  then  their 
Koyal  Highnesses  the  Prince  and  Princess  of  Wales; 
then  the  other  brothers,  sisters,  cousins — a  royal  group. 
The  Queen  was  not  present. 

I  think  every  eye  was  fixed  on  the  beautiful  Princess 
as  she  mounted  the  dais  and  courtesied  to  the  audience — 
to  the  compan}'^,  I  should  say — who  went  down  to  the 
ground  in  their  courtesy.  I  think  I  must  describe  her 
dress.  It  was  of  lilac  terry  velvet,  trimmed  with  tulle 
and  festooned  with  lilac  and  coral-red  roses.  Her  orna- 
ments were  a  tiara  of  diamonds,  with  the  orders  of  Vic- 
toria and  Albert,  the  Crown  of  India,  St.  Catherine  of 
Kussia,  St.  John  of  Jerusalem,  the  Royal  Red  Cross,  and 
the  Danish  family  order.  She  looked  so  young,  so  beau- 
tiful, so  alert,  I  could  only  think  of  a  deer  out  of  a  for- 
est instead  of  a  Princess  on  a  throne. 

I  took  my  seat  on  one  of  the  red  benches  which  rise 
in  three  degrees  about  the  ballroom,  and  looked  up  at 
the  clock,  which  was  in  front  of  the  musicians,  as  if  the 
very  hours  were  to  dance.  It  was  a  charming  figure  by 
Canova,  this  clock. 

My  young  ladies  danced,  several  friends  found  me 
out,  and  it  was  a  gay  evening.  A  noble  lord  took  me 
in  to  supper ;  we  waited  until  the  royalties  had  entered, 
and  he  showed  me  the  plate  of  George  TV.  One  does 
not  wish  to  eat  when  there  is  so  much  to  look  at. 

Coming  out  from  supper,  the  royalties  spoke  to  their 
friends,  bowed  right  and  left,  and  shook  hands,  Ameri- 
can fashion.  I  have  seen  since  then  many  times  the 
Princess  Louise,  who  is  pretty,  frank,  and  gracious,  and 


THE  ADMIEABLE   MANNERS   OF   THE   PRINCE  213 

I  met  her  and  the  Duchess  of  Connaught  at  Aix — both 
most  agreeable  young  women.  The  Queen  and  the  Prin- 
cess Beatrice  I  had  seen  at  Aix  in  1885,  and,  as  one  sees 
a  prince,  I  had  seen  Albert  Edward  of  course  very  often. 
I  am  always  struck  with  the  admirable  manners  of  the 
whole  family  and  their  prodigious  memories.  How  can 
they  remember  everybody  as  they  do  ?  This  royal 
family  of  England  desires  to  make  itself  agreeable. 
Every  one  has  a  good  word  for  the  Princess  of  Wales, 
who  is  always  driving  w^th  thft  Prince  to  open  a  bridge 
or  an  asylum,  or  on  some  great  public  function. 

As  for  the  Prince,  I  saw  him  in  the  House  of  Lords, 
walking  around,  laying  his  hands  on  the  shoulder  of  an 
old  duke,  chatting  and  being  universally  delightful.  He 
seems  to  be  the  very  pleasantest  creature  alive,  and, 
quite  independent  of  his  great  position,  a  man  of  talent 
and  tact,  industrious,  courteous,  thoughtful — a  universal 
man.  There  is  no  longer  that  divinity  which  doth 
hedge  a  king,  but  there  is  a  very  great  friendship  for 
him,  and  it  is  visible  in  all  ranks  of  life. 

It  is  not  very  far  from  the  throne  to  the  stage,  and  I 
had  the  pleasure  to  be  presented  to  Mr.  Irving  by  Gen- 
eral Horace  Porter;  this  led  to  some  very  delightful 
suppers.  I  took  the  letter  to  the  theatre  with  me,  as  I 
was  going  to  see  Faust  for  the  first  time.  Mr.  Anson 
Phelps  Stokes  and  his  daughters  were  with  me,  and  we 
left  the  letter  with  Mr.  Bram  Stoker.  It  was  at  the  end 
of  the  second  act  that  Mr.  Stoker  appeared  at  the  back 
of  the  box,  saying  that  Mr.  Irving  would  like  to  speak  to 
me ;  we  went  in  to  the  little  reception-room,  and  there 
stood  Mephistopheles,  cock's  feather,  red  dress,  phos- 
phorus on  eyelids ;  but  in  spite  of  this  terrible  sugges- 
tion of  another  state  of  existence  Mr.  Irving  smiled  like 
an  angel ;  his  fine  manner  and  high  breeding  shone  con- 


214  AN    EPISTLE    TO   POSTEEITY 

spicuously.  .  He  asked  me  "  to  choose  always  a  box  for 
any  evening,  and  hoped  we  would  sup  with  him  some 
night,  after  the  play,  that  we  might  select";  then  he 
went  back  to  his  diablerie. 

This  was  followed  by  a  supper  in  the  famous  Beef- 
steak Club-room,*  where  we  found  an  excellent  enter- 
tainment. The  long  table  was  decked  with  flowers, 
while  around  the  room  hung  pictures  of  the  Kembles, 
Mrs.  Siddons,  Macready,  of  Ellen  Terry  as  Portia,  and 
of  other  thespian  celebrities.  There  were  present  the 
Earl  of  Crawford,  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Phelps,  Sir  John  Monck- 
ton.  Lord  and  Lady  Bury,  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Dasent,  Mr. 
Toole,  Mr.  Scott,  dramatic  critic,  and  many  others — 
twenty -four  in  all,  I  think. 

Mr.  Irving  was  in  full  evening-dress,  and  although  it 
was  half-past  twelve  at  night,  every  one  seemed  to  be 
beginning  the  day,  and  the  elaborate  supper  was  served 
like  a  dinner.  We  saw  Mr.  Irving's  famous  armor}^  as 
we  entered.  I  supped  with  him  again  and  again.  Once 
I  remember  that  Lord  and  Lady  Randolph  Churchill  and 
the  present  Duchess  of  Manchester  (then  Ladj^  Mande- 
ville)  were  present.  Every  one  enjoyed  these  suppers. 
He  always  sent  me  the  Prince's  box,  and  Mr.  Bram 
Stoker  served  us  with  tea  and  ices  between  the  acts. 
This  was  going  to  see  the  play  in  a  royal  manner. 

Mr.  Irving  has  always  been  a  favorite  in  society,  the 
Prince,  Lady  Burdett-Coutts,  and  Lord  Rosebery  hav- 
ing been  conspicuously  his  friends.  Now  as  Sir  Henry 
I  dare  say  he  has  even  a  more  complete  triumph  over 
the  old  prejudice  against  actors.  He  deserves  all  that 
he  gets,  from  his  noble,  honorable  character  and  his 
very  fine  manners,  so  conspicuous  that,  as  one  of  the 

*  This  renowned  room  is  now  incorporated  in  Mr.  Irving's  tenure 
of  the  Lyceum  Theatre. 


MR.  GLADSTONE  AND  THE  CHAPEL  EOYAL      315 

critics  said  of  his  Hamlet  (which  I  have  ventured  to 
quote  about  Booth),  ''  It  is  so  gentlemanly  that  one  for- 
gets the  player,  and  thinks  only  of  the  Prince." 

It  was  on  this  visit,  I  think,  that  Lady  Constance  Les- 
lie, always  a  kind  friend,  took  me  to  the  Chapel  Eoyal, 
the  Chapel  of  Ease  of  Buckingham  Palace,  and  the  little 
historical  old  Queen  Anne  church  where  Queen  Victoria 
was  married.  I  fear  that  I  went  there  to  have  a  nearer 
look  at  Mr.  Gladstone,  who  was  then  having  all  sorts  of 
epithets  thrown  at  him  by  the 'Tories.  The  Irish  aristoc- 
racy did  not  spare  him.  When  I  first  went  to  London, 
in  1869,  he  was  being  attacked  for  his  motion  to  dises- 
tablish the  Irish  Church.  In  1884  all  England  was  again 
in  the  throes  of  a  great  political  change.  Home  Kule 
and  Conservative  policy  were  dealing  each  other  most 
disfiguring  blows,  and  Mr.  Gladstone  was  called  all  sorts 
of  names.  Sir  Henry  Thring  (now  Lord  Thring),  a  most 
distinguished  man,  told  me,  during  a  dinner  at  his  own 
house,  that  he  considered  him  "the  most  honest,  far- 
seeing  man  of  his  day,  and  yet  that  the  Queen  thought 
he  treated  her  with  disrespect "  (she  afterwards  left  him 
out  of  her  Jubilee  celebrations).  Lord  Thring  had 
drafted  all  the  acts  of  Parliament  for  thirty  years,  so  that 
he  ought  to  know,  if  any  man  did,  what  was  the  secret  of 
that  man's  power.  It  was  the  secret  of  genius  and  a 
persuasive  eloquence.  So  I  looked  my  fill  at  the  great 
head  which  half  hid  itself  in  the  collar,  rising  up  to  the 
eyebrows — that  collar  which  Punch  has  made  so  very 
familiar  to  us — with  profound  respect  for  its  power. 
And  if  people  did  not  love  him,  their  hatred  was  most 
complimentary.  I  was  driving  down  through  one  of 
the  crowded  streets  of  London  with  Lady  Galway,  a  sis- 
ter of  Lord  Houghton.  She  disagreed  with  her  Liberal 
brother,  and  was  herself  one  of  the  greatest  Tories  in 


216  AN   EPISTLE    TO   POSTERITY 

England.  She  stopped  to  buy  a  paper — "  Mr.  Gladstone's 
Defeat,  and  his  Speech  at  the  Station."  She  read  me  a 
few  phrases  aloud.    "  Well  done,  old  humbug !"  said  she. 

And  so  it  went  on,  praise  and  blame,  abuse  and  ap- 
proval, the  veriest  proof  that  an  Englishman  will  speak 
his  mind  freely.  I  think  if  any  American  statesman  had 
ever  received  such  abuse  he  would  have  sunk  into  utter 
oblivion ;  but  Mr.  Gladstone  went  on  conquering  and  to 
conquer,  until  he  asked  to  be  relieved  of  cares  of  state 
to  grow  old  in  peace. 

So  in  the  famous  Chapel  Royal,  wont  to  be  filled  with 
kings,  I  Hstened  with  half  an  ear  to  the  famous  preach- 
er, and  looked  with  both  eye  sat  Mr.  Gladstone,  who 
was  nearer  than  he  had  been  in  the  House  of  Commons. 

And  I  gave  myself  up  to  the  memories  inspired  by 
that  famous  place,  with  ceilings  painted  by  Hans  Hol- 
bein. There  can  be  seen  the  initials  of  Henry  YIII. 
and  Anne  Boleyn.  There  one  stands  outside  the  fa- 
mous Court  of  St.  James's  Palace,  where  each  new  sov- 
ereign is  proclaimed;  and  one  remembers  that  here 
Charles  I.  spent  his  last  night  on  earth  and  took  leave 
of  his  children.  Here  once  lived  Maria  de'  Medici,  the 
mother  of  Henrietta  Maria,  the  most  stately  and  mag- 
nificent woman  in  Europe ;  mother  of  one  king  and  two 
queens,  and  yet  who  died  in  a  garret  in  Cologne,  taken 
care  of  by  the  painter  Rubens.  Here  came  the  reckless 
court  of  Charles  II.,  one  of  the  chief  ornaments  of  which 
was  La  Belle  Stuart,  afterwards  Duchess  of  Richmond. 
She  inspired  Charles  II.  with  one  of  the  purest  and 
strongest  passions  of  his  life ;  he  would  have  divorced 
his  queen  to  marry  her ;  and  she  lived  to  become  the  lover 
of  cats  and  the  subject  of  Pope's  line — 

"Die  and  endow  a  college,  or  a  cat." 


SIR  JOHN   MILLAIS  217 

She  is  the  "sweet  little  Barbara"  of  history,  and  her 
profile  is  still  on  the  copper  coins  used  in  Great  Britain. 
Much  of  the  romance  and  wit  of  royal  anecdote  hangs 
around  this  palace  of  St.  James.  Here,  when  Queen 
Caroline,  wife  of  the  second  George,  asked  Mr.  Whiston, 
the  royal  chaplain,  what  fault  the  people  had  to  find 
with  her,  he  said,  "  They  complain  of  your  Majesty's 
talking  in  chapel" ;  she  promised  amendment  and  asked, 
"What  are  my  other  faults?"  "When  your  Majesty 
has  amended  this  fault  I'll  tell  you  of  the  next." 

I  wonder  if  one  of  to-day's  royal  chaplains  would  be 
as  frank  with  Queen  Victoria  ? 

This  immense  mass  of  St.  James's  Palace  is  now  given 
in  suites  of  rooms  to  the  Queen's  friends,  pensioners  and 
old  servants,  the  Guard's  review  every  day,  and  it  is  to 
the  visitor  to  London  one  of  the  most  interesting  spots. 

It  was  in  1885,  just  after  he  had  been  made  a  baronet, 
that  I  had  the  honor  of  knowing  Sir  John  Millais.  He 
was  as  handsome  as  one  of  his  own  pictures,  a  fresh, 
florid,  well-featured,  tall,  vigorous-looking  man.  I  car- 
ried him  a  letter  of  introduction  from  his  sister,  Mrs. 
Lester  Wallack,  w^hich  may  account  for  the  kindness 
with  which  he  received  me. 

Lady  Millais  appointed  an  hour  for  me  to  call,  and  I 
found  her  in  her  morning  room  with  one  of  her  "  Cherry 
Ripe "  daughters.  She  was  a  remarkably  handsome 
matron,  I  thought,  and  very  cordial.  She  immediately 
sent  for  Sir  John,  who  took  us  in  to  his  painting-room, 
sat  on  a  table  himself,  in  a  boyish  fashion,  while  we 
looked  around  the  studio,  and  talked  incessantly. 

"Will  you  come  and  lunch  with  us  informally  to- 
morrow ?"  said  he,  "  and  afterwards  we  shall  give  you 
a  dinner.     Now,  w^hom  do  you  wish  to  meet  ?" 

I  begged  him  not  to  trouble  himself  about  me,  that  a 


218  AN  EPISTLE   TO   POSTERITY 

sight  of  him  and  his  was  all  that  I  expected,  and  a 
lunch  with  the  family  far  more  than  all  I  deserved. 

But  he  insisted,  and  I  said  at  length  that  I  should  like 
to  meet  Robert  Browning.  "  Oh,"  said  he,  "  nothing 
easier ;  and  Fred  Leighton,  and  Mrs.  Procter  [Barry 
Cornwall's  widow],  and  Lord  Houghton,  and — my  dear, 
you  must  get  the  rest "  (turning  to  his  wife). 

I  told  Lady  Millais  that  I  was  in  deep  mourning  and 
hardly  expected  to  go  to  a  great  London  dinner-party. 

"  Oh,"  said  she,  kindly, "  mourning  is  always  considered 
full-dress." 

The  day  for  the  dinner  came,  and  I  got  in  &Ye  minutes 
early,  glad  to  see  Lord  Houghton  in  the  parlor  before 
Lady  Millais  came  down.  We  had  a  quiet  chat,  and 
Browning  also  arriving  ahead  of  time.  Lord  Houghton 
introduced  him  to  me.  Then  came  in  quite  a  number  of 
people.  Lady  Coutts  Lindsay  among  them ;  she  had  just 
been  divorced  from  her  husband.  Sir  Coutts  Lindsay,  of 
the  "  Greenery  Yallery,  Grosvenor  Gallery  "  fame. 

Browning  took  me  in,  and  I  had  Lord  Houghton  on 
the  other  side.  Opposite  me  was  Mrs.  Procter,  the  oldest 
queen  of  the  literary  coterie  in  London,  and  a  singular 
genius;  and  also  vis-d-vis  a  Mr.  Godwin,  famous  for  a 
mania  for  buying  the  chairs  of  distinguished  person- 
ages. 

Mr.  Browning  was  a  great  disappointment  at  first. 
He  looked  like  a  retired  ship-captain,  was  short,  rather 
stout,  red-faced,  with  a  large  nose  and  white  hair,  but  he 
was  so  simple  and  kindly  and  polite  that  I  forgave  him 
for  not  looking  the  poet.  Yery  soon  he  and  Mr.  God- 
win got  into  a  discussion  as  to  the  genuineness  of  a 
relic.  Mr.  Godwin  said  that  he  had  just  bought  a  chair, 
"  the  very  one  in  which  Mrs.  Browning  wrote  Casa 
Guidi  Windows.     Mr.  Browning  said  that  was  impos- 


SIR   FEEDEKICK   LEIGHTON 


219 


sible,  for  he  had  never  parted  with  a  thing  which  had 
been  in  her  apartments. 

Mr.  Browning  was  quite  agitated  about  this.  Mr.  God- 
win, however,  persevered,  and  said  that  the  chair  was 
one  which  Mrs.  Browning  had  given  away  in  her  lifetime 
to  certain  English  friends,  two  unmarried  sisters,  who 
were  in  Florence  Avith  her,  or  living  near  her,  after  the 
celebrity  of  the  Casa  Guidi  Windows  poems,  and  that 
they  had  asked  her  for  it. 

Mr.  Browning  could  not  disputie  this,  and  fortunately 
I  asked  a  question  about  George  Eliot,  which  turned 
the  tables. 

Mrs.  Procter  declared  that  she  "  had  never  called  on 
George  Eliot ;  that  she  would  not  have  taken  a  house- 
maid with  such  a  character.'' 

This  brought  out  Browning  and  Lord  Houghton,  who 
told  me  many  hitherto  unknown  stories  about  Thornton 
Hunt,  the  supposed  lover  of  the  first  Mrs.  Lewes ;  of 
Lewes  himself,  and  of  George  Eliot,  who  seemed  to 
have  been  most  generous  and  self-sacrificing  in  giving 
up  fame  and  name  for  Lewes,  whom  they  did  not  think 
deserved  so  much  goodness. 

I  saw  Sir  Frederick  Leighton  often  after  this  at  his 
beautiful  house  in  Holland  Park,  and  he  seemed  to 
emulate  Millais  in  being  the  prince  of  good  fellows,  as 
well  as  an  artist  of  great  talent.  They  both  had  their 
critics  as  to  the  greatness  of  their  genius,  but  they  had 
the  good  luck  to  please  their  immediate  public. 

There  was  no  apparent  jealousy  of  "rival  easels" 
between  them.  After  Leighton  became  "  Sir  Frederick  " 
I  heard  that  Millais  said,  "  Good !  he  was  born  to  a  title, 
and  we  all  know  his  love  of  pur-ple^^^  Leighton  being 
criticised  for  his  purples. 

Sir  Frederick  Leighton  was  indeed  a  most  aristocratic 


220  AN   EPISTLE   TO   POSTERITY 

man,  in  looks,  in  bearing,  and  in  manners.  His  accom- 
plishments were  so  various  that  he  might  have  been 
only  a  carpet  knight  had  he  chosen ;  but  he  was  an  in- 
dustrious artist,  a  hard-working,  painstaking  man. 

The  four  great  men  who  made  that  dinner  famous-^ 
Millais,  Leighton,  Lord  Houghton,  and  Browning — are 
all  dead.  Mrs.  Procter,  whose  celebrated  husband  wrote 
the  life  of  Charles  Lamb,  is  also  dead ;  she  had  herself 
known  Charles  Lamb,  and  was  very  indignant  because 
a  certain  litterateur  in  London  had  asked  her  if  he  did 
not  resemble  that  famous  author. 

"  As  if  any  one  who  did  could  have  asked  such  a 
question,"  said  the  angry  old  ladj^ 

Lord  Houghton  dedicated  to  her  his  Life  of  Keats — 
"  To  the  wife  of  one  poet,  the  mother  of  another,  and 
friend  of  all  poets." 

Mr.  Lowell  adored  this  old  lady,  and  used  to  bend  on 
one  knee  and  kiss  her  hand.  Her  stepfather  was  Basil 
Montagu,  so  she  had  a  real  literary  descent  and  dynasty. 

She  was  just  as  old  as  the  century,  and  lived,  I  believe, 
to  be  eighty-eight.  The  Queen  sent  her  a  special  invi- 
tation and  a  ticket  to  the  Abbey  on  her  Jubilee  day. 

After  this  dinner  she  asked  me  to  come  to  her  every 
Sunday  afternoon  at  four.  I  was  apt  to  find  a  nota- 
ble gathering  of  literary  and  fashionable  people  in  her 
rooms  at  "  Queen  Anne's  Mansions." 

"  Society  costs,"  and  fortunately  Millais  had  become 
very  rich.  He  had  a  beautiful  house,  corner  of  Princes 
Gate,  and  he  was  just  going  off  to  Scotland  for  the 
shooting  when  I  first  met  him.  Everything  went  well 
with  him.  He  had  an  admirable  temperament,  I  should 
say,  with  tremendous  physique  and  indomitable  indus- 
try. He  loved  fun,  and  was  boyish  in  manner.  One  could 
imagine  him  at  a  country  fair  enjoying  its  drollery  and 


A   GLIMPSE   OF   DU   MAURIER  221 

din,  and  could  picture  him  with  the  humorous  look  in 
his  eye,  his  careless  necktie,  his  curling  hair  and  high 
color,  as  the  centre  of  a  group  of  rustic  revellers.  Yet 
his  business  was  to  paint  fashionable  ladies,  dukes 
and  duchesses,  pretty  children,  romantic  lovers ;  and  al- 
though he  was  not  a  courtier,  he  could  be  one  if  he 
chose :  he  was  a  universal  man.  He  was  prodigal  in 
kindness  to  young  and  struggling  genius,  but  he  was 
never  extravagant  for  himself.  His  death  was  said  to 
have  been  hastened  by  an  over-indulgence  in  smoking. 
Doubtless,  too,  he  hastened  the  fatal  hour  by  overwork. 
His  was  not  the  nature  to  spare  himself. 

He  was  one  of  the  few  infant  phenomena  who  raised 
himself  into  an  assured  fame,  and  although  belonging 
to  that  profession  which  is  said  to  be  helpful  to  the 
"  noble  art  of  making  enemies,"  according  to  Whistler, 
yet  he  managed  to  make  very  few.  His  life  was  in  its 
artistic  excellence  admirably  subordinated  to  the  virtues 
of  the  citizen,  the  husband,  the  father,  and  the  friend.  I 
also  had  the  pleasure  of  seeing  Du  Maurier  and  his  lovely 
wife  at  the  house  of  Lady  Constance  Leslie.  How  little 
did  I  imagine  that  Trilhy  lay  behind  that  plain  face ! 

I  was  in  London  again  for  the  Jubilee  in  1887. 

"  How  do  you  spell  Jubilee  with  five  letters  ?"  asked 
Mr.  Gladstone  of  Sir  William  Yernon  Harcourt. 

"You — ^and  /left  out,"  was  the  ready  response. 

Yes,  it  was  the  first  ceremony  in  which  the  G.  O.  M. 
had  been  left  out  for  many  years. 

One  of  our  American  celebrities  was  amusing  London, 
and  I  was  one  day  startled  by  an  invitation  to  meet  one 
of  my  most  "  distinguished  countrymen."  I  went,  and 
was  presented  to  Buffalo  Bill !  But  perhaps  he  deserved 
the  role  of  lion  quite  as  well  as  many  who  have  since  as- 
pired to  that  distinction.    Certainly  he  carried  it  off  well. 


CHAPTER  Xin 

My  Continental  Note  -  book— The  Praise  of  Paris— Meissonier  and 
Politics— The  Salon  of  1886— "Varnishing  Day"  — Sara  Bern- 
hardt's  "  Theodora  " — Nice  and  Monte  Carlo — La  Duchesse  de 
Pomar,  Lady  Caithness — A  Sad  Loss  to  the  American  Colony. 

It  is  unnecessary,  perhaps,  for  me  to  say  that  I  bade 
adieu  to  the  British  lion  with  regret.  He  is  a  very 
good  lion,  and  as  he  stands  above  Westminster  Bridge, 
looking  down  on  his  London,  I  could  not  but  feel  that 
he  had  reason  to  be  a  proud  lion.  My  last  days  in  Lon- 
don were  full  of  brilliant  events,  not  the  least  note- 
worthy of  which  was  my  acquaintance  with  Lord  Salis- 
bury, Browning,  Millais,  Sir  William  Yernon  Harcourt, 
and  a  renewal  of  my  old  friendship  with  Lord  Houghton. 

It  was  a  fine,  clear  day  when  I  essayed  the  journey 
from  Folkestone  to  Boulogne.  The  sea  was  as  smooth 
as  glass,  and  we  came  all  too  soon  upon  what  poor  Beau 
Brummell  called  the  "  one  front  tooth  of  France  which 
fastens  like  a  fang  in  the  flesh  of  the  British  debtor." 
Here  he  spent  his  inglorious  last  years,  poor  Beau,  sigh- 
ing for  the  opposite  shore.  It  is  an  interesting  town — 
Boulogne.  I  wish  I  knew  more  of  it  than  its  buffet 
where  I  got  an  excellent  French  soup,  some^^^^'^^  jpois^ 
and  filet  de  hceuf,  and  some  magnificent  strawberries. 
The  cookery  began  to  mend  immediately  after  reaching 
France. 

We  got  a  cup  of  tea  at  Amiens,  but  I  had  to  sorrow 
with  my  fellow-passengers  whose  courier  had  left  the 


A   SECOND   VISIT   TO   PARIS  223 

bag  containing  all  their  money  and  letter  of  credit  in 
the  buffet  at  Boulogne.  By  the  tidal  train  one  reaches 
Paris  at  seven  o'clock,  and  the  long  drive  through  the 
gay  city,  so  unlike  London,  with  all  its  inhabitants  out-of- 
doors  eating  and  drinking,  and  happy  in  the  soft,  bright, 
beautiful  summer  air,  seemed  to  justify  the  opinion  of 
Julius  Caesar  over  the  old  Lutetia — the  old  Paris — that 
this  favored  spot  "  had  amusement  in  the  air."  What- 
ever wounds  the  Commune  made,  they  are  long  since 
healed.  My  reflections  are  those  of  an  untravelled  per- 
son, as  the  Englishman  said  who  visited  America  two 
years  ago  and  was  pleased  to  observe  that  there  were 
no  ''  Red  Indians  at  Castle  Garden,  but  some  up-town 
with  a  Mr.  Barnum."  To  get  rooms  which  looked  into 
the  lovely  gardens  of  the  Tuileries  was  my  next  achieve- 
ment, and  a  drive  in  the  Bois  the  second. 

The  season  was  over — the  Grand  Prix  finishes  that — 
but  the  Bois  was  crowded.  No  great  ladies  out  but  one 
Russian  princess,  whose  footmen  had  blue  silk  stockings 
and  cocked  hats ;  some  very  pretty  women  in  white  in 
their  victorias,  showing  their  feet  very  much,  and  not  so 
painted  as  the  London  blondes ;  indeed,  the  two  nations 
seem  to  have  exchanged  characters.  The  English  affect 
French  naughtiness ;  the  French  affect  to  remember  an 
old  legend,  that  English  phlegm  means  "  respectability." 
Many  Americans  drove  along  in  low  carriages  in  the 
most  beautiful  dresses.  Worth  cannot  be  hired  to  make 
dresses  for  anybody  but  Americans  nowadays. 

Too  late  for  the  Salon,  but  not  for  Meissonier !  In 
1834  Meissonier  exhibited  his  first  work  of  art,  "  Les 
Bourgeois  Hamands,"  which  figures  at  the  head  of  the 
present  catalogue  of  one  hundred  and  forty-six  master- 
pieces ;  so  this  exhibition  is  really  his  jubilee,  and  the 
proceeds  he  gives  for  the  benefit  of  the  Hospitality  de 


224  AN   EPISTLE    TO    POSTERITY 

Nuit,  a  most  deserving  charity.  The  last-named  work 
on  his  catalogue  is  an  unfinished  historical  sketch,  or 
rather  an  allegorical  one,  called  "Paris,  1870-1871." 
Conflagration,  smoke,  and  trouble  everywhere.  Paris, 
a  noble  female  figure  in  a  lion's  skin,  is  stretching  a 
funeral  veil  over  Kegnault,  the  sculptor,  who  died  for 
her.  At  her  feet  are  the  dead  and  dying.  Frere  Anselm, 
wearing  the  red  Geneva  cross,  receives  the  fatal  bullet 
which  made  him  drop  the  wounded  soldier.  A  formi- 
dable cannon,  fired  by  sailors,  seems  to  vomit  death.  A 
mobile  is  hurling  imprecations  against  the  enemy.  Be- 
hind the  figure  of  Paris  a  woman  is  throwing  herself 
into  the  arms  of  her  husband,  who  has  just  left  the  ram- 
parts. She  shows  him  the  dead  figure  of  an  infant  who 
has  died  of  starvation.  Altogether  not  a  cheerful  pict- 
ure, but  a  wonderful  sketch !  It  is  the  horrible  apothe- 
osis of  war. 

"  Les  Bravos,"  loaned  by  Sir  Kichard  Wallace,  is  a 
more  agreeable  subject.  In  composition,  finish,  color- 
ing, light,  and  perfection  of  drawing,  it  is  truly  a 
wonderful  picture.  Two  bravoes  are  standing  behind  a 
closed  door;  one  of  them,  armed  with  a  short  Swiss 
sword,  is  bending  down  to  hear  what  is  going  on  be- 
hind the  key-hole ;  at  the  same  time  he  makes  signs  to 
his  less  experienced,  less  bloodthirsty  companion,  whose 
courage,  like  Bob  Acres's,  seems  oozing  out  at  his  fin- 
ger-ends. 

Then  there  is  the  famous  "  La  Rixe,"  presented  by 
!N"apoleon  III.  to  Prince  Albert,  who  admired  it  at  the 
Exposition  of  1855.  This  is  loaned  by  the  Queen.  The 
chairs  and  tables,  the  cards  (the  origin  of  the  quarrel), 
are  upset  on  the  floor.  The  two  adversaries  are  glaring 
at  each  other  ;  one  stands  in  the  grasp  of  two  friends, 
who  are  holding  him  back,  while  he  strains  every  mus- 


MEISSONIER   AND  POLITICS  225 

cle  to  free  himself ;  the  other  coolly  leans  on  the  hilt  of 
his  sword. 

Then  there  is  Meissonier's  favorite,  "1814:" — Napo- 
leon retiring  from  Moscow.  It  is  so  small — so  small — 
the  whole  figure,  man  and  horse,  only  live  inches  high ; 
yet  in  it  are  five  centuries  of  greatness  and  a  mountain- 
height  of  thought. 

The  famous  "  Solferino,"  from  the  Luxembourg,  and  a 
small  picture,  not  larger  than  a  crown-piece,  of  "  The 
Tale  of  the  Siege  of  Berg-op-Zoom,"  are  also  among  the 
gems. 

As  I  passed  the  little  statue  of  Joan  of  Arc  which 
stands  at  the  head  of  the  Eue  de  Kivoli,  I  was  glad  to 
remember  that  Jules  Favre,  a  deputy  and  ex-professor 
»of  history,  has  written  a  glowing  life  of  the  Maid, 

"That  fairest  lily  in  the  shield  of  France, 
With  heart  of  burning  gold." 

And  now  he  proposes  a  national  fete  in  her  honor,  and 
desires  this  idea  to  be  widely  known  in  England,  being 
persuaded  that  he  will  receive  much  encouragement 
from  that  country.  It  is  like  asking  the  Bonaparte 
family  to  build  a  statue  to  the  Duke  of  Wellington. 
However,  international  animosities  have  disappeared; 
and  as  Joan  of  Arc  has  become  a  symbol  of  patriotism 
and  freedom  of  conscience,  there  may  be  a  sympathy 
with  this  idea  among  patriotic  Englishmen.  M.  Favre 
makes  the  Maid  a  human,  non-supernatural,  patriotic  en- 
thusiast— a  model  for  all  nations.  The  Koman  Church 
has  hesitated  to  canonize  her  because  she  contemplated 
suicide.  Poor  girl!  no  wonder  if  she  did.  It  is  said 
that  Bishop  Cauchon  acted  under  English  influence,  as 
if  it  w^ere  any  excuse  for  him  that  he  was  fanatical  to 

15 


236  AN   EPISTLE   TO   POSTERITY 

order!  The  republican  deputies,  however,  voted  with 
M.  Favre,  and  the  6th  of  May  will  be  the  annual  fete 
of  Joan  of  Arc,  now  and  for  evermore. 

But  why  do  I  give  so  much  time  to  poor  dead  and  gone 
Joan,  when  the  great  city  of  Paris  remains  to  be  de- 
scribed ?  The  Place  de  la  Concorde  stands  where  it  did, 
a  beautiful  square  full  of  statues.  That  of  Strasburg 
is  always  in  mourning.  The  column  in  the  Place  Yen- 
dome  is  built  up,  but,  alas!  the  little  man  with  the  cocked 
hat  has  given  way  to  a  Roman  figure.  La  Tour,  St. 
Jacques,  and  the  Chatelet  still  remind  us  of  the  middle 
ages.  The  Arc  de  Triomphe  is  as  matchless  as  ever, 
the  Luxembourg  as  picturesque.  The  Tuileries  are  fair 
outside,  but  within  they  show  the  ravening  wolves.  The 
Cour  du  Carrousel  records  the  Hundred  Days,  while  St. 
Germain  -  I'Auxerrois  is  a  riot  of  mediaeval  loveliness. 
Straight  and  grand  is  the  Hotel  des  Invalides,  magnifi- 
cent the  Hotel  de  Yille.  Notre  Dame  bears  the  mighty 
monogram  of  Victor  Hugo.  St.  Etienne  du  Mont  re- 
calls the  murdered  archbishop.  The  Hotel  Bristol  is 
redolent  of  the  Prince  of  Wales.  It  is  a  strange  mixt- 
ure of  past  and  present ;  and  one  drives  over  the  Seine 
as  in  a  dream  in  which  the  letters  "  R.  F." — Republique 
Fran^aise — seem  a  grim  mockery.  This  city  is  the 
creation  of  a  series  of  tyrants,  and  to  keep  it  in  this 
perfect  loveliness  they  need  a  tyrant.  To  be  sure,  its 
legends  are  all  in  force. 

The  cafes  chantants  are  still  gayly  illuminated  for 
the  gayety  of  nations.  The  music  of  many  bands 
fills  the  air.  The  Place  de  la  Concorde  burns  with 
colored  lamps,  and  a  lurid  glow  lights  up  the  obelisk. 
Pretty  and  artificial  as  is  the  Bois,  it  still  has  the  fra- 
grant air  of  the  green  trees  ;  the  locust  blossoms  are  per- 
fumed au  naturel.    And  yet  it  all  looks  as  if  the  fatigued 


FRENCH   POLITICS  227 

king  of  Versailles  and  Pompadour  reigned  ;  their  faded 
roses  still  hang  from  blue  chaplets  around  the  statue  of 
the  Genius  of  Paris. 

As  for  politics,  I  hesitate  to  speak.  The  report  that 
M.  Ferry  is  not  in  harmony  with  his  colleagues  is  quite 
true.  He  is  immeasurably  their  superior.  MM.  Martin 
Fallieres  et  Herissen  are  both  barristers,  but  lack  the 
usual  legal  power  to  defend  themselves.  They  say  that 
wnth  Fallieres  the  sword  is  more  powerful  than  the  pen  ; 
that  he  Avould  have  stood  a  good  chance  with  Clemen- 
ceau  or  Paul  de  Cassagnac  on  the  terrain,  but  in  the 
Chamber  was  ignominiously  defeated  by  a  pupil  of  the 
former.  General  Campenon  drummed  a  lady  out  of  her 
apartment  because  her  piano  practice  annoyed  him.  He 
is  a  soldier,  w^ho  cannot  forget  the  barracks.  M.  Heris- 
sen does  not  speak  good  French,  and  his  Latin  offends 
Henri  Eochefort. 

With  M.  Ferry  are,  however.  Admiral  Peyron,  MM. 
Reynal  et  Fallieres,  quite  worthy  of  his  confidence. 
They  are  all,  however,  abused  as  if  they  were  members 
of  Congress,  and  the  Chamber  does  not  seem  as  digni- 
fied as  the  House  of  Commons,  and  still  less  than  the 
"  Lords."  M.  Tirard  is  the  most  elegant  of  all  Minis- 
ters of  Finance,  w^hile  Fallieres  is  the  most  courteous  of 
men.  On  the  other  hand,  Labuze  and  Leon  Say  work 
in  their  shirt -sleeves.  They  think  it  comme  ilfaut  to 
be  sans  gene.  M.  Waldeck-Rousseau  is  called  the  Due 
de  Morny  of  the  Third  Republic,  and  is  the  perfection 
of  neatness. 

M.  Ferry  is  of  a  very  dictatorial  turn  of  mind,  but  he 
cannot  prevent  the  bluster  and  the  bombast  of  the  French 
Chamber.  A  separation  is  foreboded  between  the 
"  Union  Democratique "  and  the  "Union  Republicaine." 
(It  sounds  like  home !) 


228  AN   EPISTLE  TO   POSTERITY 

Altogether,  however,  Republican  France  looks  very 
pretty.  To-morrow  I  go  to  see  the  crown  diamonds, 
which  have  now  no  wearer.  I  remember  how  they 
sparkled  on  the  fine  brow  of  Eugenie,  and  regret  that 
they  must  blush  unseen. 

Some  one  said  the  old  population  of  Paris  was  made 
up  of  "  grands  seigneurs,  priests,  monks,  nuns,  parasites, 
opera  dancers,  hair-dressers,  tailors,  milliners,  play-actors, 
lawyers,  fiddlers,  hangmen,  cooks,  and  kings."  There 
are  plenty  of  kings  out  of  business  here,  but  the  peo- 
ple of  the  blood  royal  are  now  the  ouvriers — Egalite, 
Fraternite,  etc.,  etc. 

They  say  that  religion  is  out  of  fashion  in  Paris,  and 
that  their  rulers  and  masters  have  quarrelled  with  the 
Deity ;  that  M.  Ferry  has  concluded  that  the  Bible  is  an 
old  wife's  story,  and  that  if  St.  Paul  should  preach  on 
the  boulevards  to-morrow  he  would  be  hooted  down. 
However,  on  great  church  holidays  and  holydays  the 
Catholic  ceremonies  still  draw  thousands  to  the  Made- 
leine and  Notre  Dame.  The  pageantry  of  Catholicism 
is  almost  the  only  remnant  of  the  picturesque  mediaeval 
life  of  France.  The  Frenchmen  love  spectacle  in  their 
heart  of  hearts,  and  on  the  Fete-Dieu  the  outside  of  the 
Madeleine,  the  Trinite,  and  St.  Augustin's  were  bright 
with  red  and  gold  and  flowers.  Although  the  priests  no 
longer  bear  aloft  the  host  through  the  streets  as  they 
did  in  the  old  days,  they  revere  it  all  the  same. 

I  was  in  Paris  again  in  the  spring  of  1885.  To  arrive 
in  Paris  before  "Varnishing  Day,"  and  when  the  horse- 
chestnuts  are  in  blossom,  is  to  achieve  what  every  old 
European  traveller  desires.  The  spring  season  in  Paris 
opened  this  year  with  a  remarkable  gayety  and  fulness  of 
resource  for  the  traveller,  and,  as  the  weather  had  been 
lovely,  the  spectacle  in  the  Champs-Elysees  and  at  the 


THE    SALON   OF   1885  »»» 

Salon  was  all  that  the  imagination  could  have  desired, 
for  the  *' Jour  de  Yernissage"  is  the  day  when  the  ac- 
tresses, the  painters,  the  authors,  and  the  celebrities  flock 
to  the  Salon  to  see  and  to  be  seen.  There  was  Sara 
Bernhardt,  playing  the  role  of  fine  lady,  and  playing  it 
quietly  and  well.  There  were  her  assistants  in  the  great 
play  of  Theodora — Marie  Laurent,  Marie  Yallette,  and 
Marie  Yallier.  There  was  the  superb  Philippe  Garnier, 
whose  resemblance  to  the  young  Augustus  has  procured 
for  him  the  proud  role  of  Justinian.  There  was  Coque- 
lin  aine  and  Got  and  Worms  and  Delaunay  and  Galli 
Marie  and  Lassalle  (Hamlet)  and  Fides  Deouis  and  Ca- 
poul  (looking  very  old) ;  and  there  were  Bourguereau  and 
Cabanel  and  Carolus  Duran,  and  our  promising  young 
artists  of  American  birth — Stewart  and  Sargeant  and 
Eliot  Gregory  and  Stephen  Parker,  who  painted  the  por- 
trait which  ornaments  this  volume.  The  toilets  were  su- 
perb. What  an  opportunity  to  one  to  whom  *'  Yarnish- 
ing  Day  "  was  also  vanishing  day,  and  whose  hours  were 
numbered,  to  see  the  spring  fashions !  Everything  was 
lovely  but  the  bonnets,  which  were  hideous — too  eccen- 
tric, too  high,  too  unbecoming.  Sara  Bernhardt  had  a 
becoming  bonnet,  and  the  soft  lace  and  lilacs  suited  her 
light  hair  and  long,  Jewish,  but  delicate  features.  One 
of  the  pretty  actresses  was  dressed  in  bright  green  like 
a  lettuce,  with  a  white  and  yellow  of  the  accompanying 
egg-and-salad  dressing.  She  was  unanimously  called 
Mayonnaise.  But  to  come  to  the  pictures :  It  is  four 
hours'  good  work  to  see  the  Salon.  The  Salle  Carree, 
which  is  first  entered,  is  full  of  immense  canvases,  of 
which  I  remember  "  Le  Travail,"  by  Roll — stone-cutters 
hard  at  work,  admirably  done,  but  not  interesting ; 
Burst's  "Le  Eeveil,"  better,  and  our  American  artist 
Stewart's  "  Hunt  Ball,"  wonderful  and  pleasing.    "  Le 


230  AN   EPISTLE   TO    POSTERITY 

Calme  du  Lori,"  by  Charles  H.  Davis,  is  also  a  good  pict- 
ure, and  there  were  some  fine  portraits.  In  the  rooms 
which  follow  I  remember  Harrison's  marine  pictures 
with  great  pleasure,  and  also  W.  H.  Howe's  "Cattle,'* 
and  "Walter  Gay's  charming  "Fileuses";  Friese's  "Bri- 
gands du  Desert"  is  a  very  strong  picture ;  then  there  are 
the  "  Ketour  de  la  Eevue"  of  Charles  Delort,  a  fine  cav- 
alier picture,  Cabanel's  "Fille  de  Jephte"  (which  I  did 
not  like),  and  certain  immense  canvases.  Miss  Gardiner's 
"  Coin  de  Ferme"  is  admirable — a  pleasant  contrast  to  all 
this  splash  of  paint.  An  English  artist,  Giles,  has  a  good 
battle-piece.  The  most  truly  strong  exponent  of  the 
French  genius  and  French  nationality  is  a  picture  called 
"  Les  Foux,"  by  Jean  Berand,  which  is  most  touching, 
most  romantic,  and  very  sad.  Another  thorough  touch 
of  Parisian  work  is  the  "A  I'Orgue"  of  Henry  Lerolle, 
which  is  very  beautiful.  There  is  a  Dutch  painter  named 
Israels,  who  has  sent  a  detachment  of  soldiers  marching 
for  the  Indies,  which  is  a  masterly  picture.  Mr.  Ralph 
Curtis,  of  Boston,  has  two  Venetian  scenes.  Mr.  Tem- 
pleman  Coolidge  has  an  old  woman  praying,  very  inter- 
esting and  well  treated.  Mr.  Stephen  Parker  has  a 
"Breton  Fisher  Girl,"  Mr.  Eliot  Gregory  a  portrait, 
so  that  American  artists  are  well  represented,  and  are 
honorably  conspicuous.  So  much  for  the  first  view 
of  the  Salon  of  1885,  with  which  I  must  confess  my- 
self disappointed.  There  is  a  wilderness  of  common- 
place and  much  that  is  ugly  and  poor.  It  is  a  lament- 
able thing  to  say,  but  there  seems  no  inspiration,  no 
evolvement  of  the  beautiful,  no  intricate  poetic  con- 
ception, no  freshness.  It  is  all  "  technique,  technique." 
There  is  little  independence  of  vision ;  all  "  treatment " 
with  no  apprehension  of  the  thing  to  treat.  There 
is  no  appreciation  of  the  truth  that  the  artist  should 


PARIS    AT  ITS  BEST  231 

control  and  subdue  his  subject ;  and  he  should  also  have 
a  subject  to  subdue  and  control.  They  are  adventurous, 
these  artists.  They  draw  admirably ;  they  do  not  color 
so  well,  and  they  have  few  ideals.  Perhaps  to  come  fresh 
from  a  winter's  study  of  Michael  Angelo  and  Raphael 
and  Domenichino  and  the  Carracci  is  apt  to  make  one 
rather  difficile  ;  but  that  ideal  which  was  once  the  real 
world  of  the  artist  seems  to  have  fled,  and  that  present 
world,  "  all  around  us  lying,"  does  not  seem  to  have  re- 
vealed itself  to  the  artist  with  its  truest  and  most  tender 
grace.  That  privileged  and  exceptional  entrance  into 
the  secrets  of  human  emotion,  possessed,  let  us  say,  by 
Washington  Allston  and  many  another  cherished  name, 
has  not  been  given  to  the  artists  of  this  year's  Salon. 
A  critic  of  the  day  sums  up  the  subject  by  saying  that 
too  many  young  painters  of  the  day  work  for  the  crowd, 
and  not  for  art.  But,  then,  should  not  the  painters  of 
the  day  work  for  the  education  of  the  crowd?  The 
same  critic  says  that  there  is  more  warmth,  more  move- 
ment, and  better  taste  shown  in  the  selection  of  subjects 
this  year  than  last.    Let  us  hope  so. 

The  scene  after  the  morning's  exhibition  in  the  Champs 
£lysees  was  most  picturesque — the  gayest  equipages, 
the  finest  horses,  the  most  lovely  toilets,  and  all  that 
varied  and  peculiar  crowd  which  gathers  under  the  horse- 
chestnuts — all  was  most  exciting !  A  wonderful  city ! 
The  whole  population  seemed  to  lunch  in  the  open  air. 
The  rival  restaurants  on  the  asphalt  did  a  flourishing 
business.  Hundreds  of  extra  waiters  had  been  hired  at 
the  "  Ambassadeurs  "  and  at  Le  Doy eu's  famous  restau- 
rant, and  yet  they  could  not  feed  the  hungry  multitude. 
After  breakfast,  as  mid-day  lunch  is  called  here,  was  over, 
the  people  went  back  to  the  Salon  to  look  at  the  pictures. 
As  ten  francs,  which  is  an  unusual  sum,  was  charged  for 


233  AN   EPISTLE   TO   POSTERITY 

admission,  the  result  was  very  handsome — some  150,000 
francs — all  of  which  will  be  sent  to  the  wounded  soldiers 
in  Tonquin.     So  much  for  "  Varnishing  Day." 

I  have  been  to  see  Sara  Bernhardt  in  Theodora^ 
which  is  one  of  the  events  of  the  season.  It  is  a  line 
drama  by  Yictorien  Sardou,  in  which  we  have  the  old 
story  of  the  beautiful  daughter  of  the  bear-keeper,  born, 
let  us  say,  in  the  year  500,  and  destined  to  rise  from  the 
spangled  slipper  of  the  dancer  to  the  imperial  purple  of 
the  empress.  The  enigmatical  character  of  Theodora, 
who  held  Justinian  in  her  power  all  her  life — this  beau- 
tiful, clever,  imperial,  bad  creature — was  never  so  well 
illustrated  as  by  Sara  Bernhardt,  who  goes  from  the 
empress  to  the  daughter  of  the  people  with  a  bound  as 
impressive  and  powerful  in  both  as  was  the  original. 
She  is  a  woman  of  remarkable  reading  and  intelligence 
or  she  could  never  have  mastered  so  completely  this  his- 
toric role. 

August  Marrast  says  of  Theodora  in  his  Vie  Byzan- 
tine au  VI.  Siecle :  ^'  The  empress  joined  to  a  superior 
mind  a  rare  culture,  an  audacious  and  indomitable  char- 
acter. She  put  an  enormous  energy  into  the  accom- 
plishment of  her  purposes.  She  divined  the  intentions 
of  her  adversaries,  while  she  remained  impenetrable.  IN'o 
one  was  a  more  faithful  friend,  nor  a  more  pitiless  enemy. 
In  the  luxurious  life  which  her  invalid  condition  ren- 
dered necessary — for  she  could  only  live  by  a  sort  of  in- 
terminable hot  bath — she  found  still  the  time  and  energy 
to  interest  herself  in  all  the  cares  of  state.  She  rallied  i 
the  wits,  disputed  with  the  doctors,  laughed  at  fate,  but 
compelled  it,  and  immolated  her  victims  with  the  superb 
calm  with  which  Apollo  flayed  Marsyas.  Justinian  loved 
this  vagabond  Phryne  with  one  of  those  overwhelming, 
absolute  passions  which  are  peculiar  to  laborious  and  con- 


SARA   BERNHARDT  233 

centrated  men.    Theology  and  the  Pandects  had  their 
day,  but  his  love  for  Theodora  endured  forever." 

Such  are  the  stormy  couple  and  their  more  stormy 
history  which  Sardou  has  taken  for  the  hero  and  heroine 
of  one  of  the  most  striking  of  all  modern  dramas.  "  The 
inevitable  Eros"  found  them  out,  and  Theodora  in  the 
drama  is  carrying  on  a  secret  intrigue  with  an  old 
lover,  who  is  at  the  head  of  a  conspiracy  to  kill  the  em- 
peror. Andreas  does  not  know  that  the  beautiful  widow 
of  a  silk-merchant,  whom  he  has  rescued  from  an  earth- 
quake, is  the  hated  and  wicked  empress  whom  he  de- 
nounces. The  scene  is  in  Constantinople,  where  women 
are  always  veiled.  He  has  never  seen  the  face  of  the 
empress,  nor  that  of  his  adored  Myrta.  Sara  Bernhardt 
has  here  a  grand  and  unusual  opportunity  for  her  splen- 
did dramatic  talent.  She  first  appears  in  a  gorgeous 
salon,  surrounded  with  Byzantine  magnificence,  receiv- 
ing with  haughty  nonchalance  the  homage  of  the  world. 
After  the  necessary  time  given  to  public  duties  she  bounds 
off  her  couch  and  is  the  dancer — the  daughter  of  the 
people.  It  seems  scarcely  a  moment  before  she  appears 
in  the  most  classic,  simple,  and  perfectly  artistic  dress, 
ready  to  go  veiled  to  the  house  of  an  old  magician,  who 
sells  love  philters.  Here  she  finds  some  tigers  and  bears 
chained,  and  the  daughter  of  the  bear-keeper  plays  with 
them  through  the  bars,  teasing  her  old  play-fellows. 
This  is  a  wonderfully  pretty  scene.  She  gets  her  love 
philter  and  goes  to  the  young  Greek — her  Andreas — 
whom  she  loves.  Her  love-making,  her  sinuosity,  her 
creeping,  insidious  charm,  recall  the  serpent  of  old  Nile. 
"The  honest  and  pure  passion"  of  Andreas  for  his  un- 
known Myrta  makes  him  forget  his  sombre  intentions, 
and  Theodora  forgets  her  greatness.  All  is  exquisite, 
like  two  young  lovers  of  the  Golden  Age  listening  to  the 


234  AN   EPISTLE   TO   POSTERITY 

nightingales,  when  Andreas,  suddenly,  after  promising 
her  that  he  will  abandon  conspiracies  on  general  princi- 
ples, mentions  his  horror  of  that  infamous  empress — 
that  wretched  Theodora,  the  worst  and  lowest  of  wom- 
en !  In  his  wrath  he  looks  away  from  her,  although 
she  is  lying  with  her  head  resting  on  his  knees.  She 
raises  her  veil  for  air.  The  audience  see  the  face  that 
he  does  not  see ;  and  Avhat  a  face !  Even  Eachel  never 
surpassed  it !  It  is  a  miracle  of  tragedy !  Then  comes 
a  superb  scene  between  the  emperor  and  the  empress. 
The  crafty,  cowardly  Justinian,  obedient  to  her  lightest 
caprices,  is  troubled  by  the  rumors  of  disaffection  and 
revolt.  Theodora  counsels  patience  and  promises  to 
save  him.  The  part  of  Justinian  is  played  by  a  young 
actor,  Philippe  Garnier,  who  has  been  trained  for  the 
part  from  his  extraordinary  resemblance  to  the  old 
Eoman  face^that  of  the  young  Augustus  of  the  many 
busts ;  it  is  all  there,  the  straight  brows,  the  perfect 
nose,  the  retreating  mouth,  that  formal  and  strong  chin. 
He  is  perfectly  classic — modelled  after  the  antique. 

The  winter  of  1884-85  found  me,  in  November,  in  Nice, 
preparing  to  travel  towards  Eome  over  the  Oorniche 
road.  To  travel  Eomeward  any  way  was  bliss ;  to  go 
by  this  exquisite  Eiviera,  and  to  see  Cannes,  Nice,  Monte 
Carlo,  Mentone,  San  Eemo,  and  the  Maritime  Alps,  with 
the  Mediterranean — a  sapphire  set  in  sapphire — this  was 
painting  the  lily  and  adding  a  perfume  to  the  violet. 
Some  travellers  call  Nice  an  artificial  dried  butterfly. 
There  is  not  much  to  see  there  except  the  frivolous  of; 
all  nations.  The  climate  is  so  highly  charged  with  oxy- 
gen that  it  brings  on  a  fidgety  unsettledness.  It  is  the 
home  of  the  adventurers  of  all  nations,  but  still  it  is 
beautiful,  and  amused  me  for  a  short  time. 

I  met  there  a  rather  remarkable  woman  whom  I  had 


NICE   AND  MONTE   CARLO  235 

seen  in  New  York,  the  Duchess  de  Pomar,  Countess  of 
Caithness,  a  great  Theosophist  and  believer  in  Spirit- 
ualism, who  imagined  herself  a  reincarnation  of  Mary 
Queen  of  Scots.  She  was  a  most  amiable  and  hospitable 
person,  and  took  me  into  the  room  which  she  had  fitted 
up  after  a  room  in  Holyrood.  She  had  paid  a  midnight 
visit  to  Holyrood,  and  thought  Mary  Queen  of  Scots 
came  and  kissed  her.  She  talked  very  well,  and  had  a 
great  deal  of  learning  of  various  sorts.  Her  son,  the 
Due  de  Pomar,  of  Spanish  descent,  has  literary  talents 
and  has  written  some  very  clever  novels.  I  afterwards 
visited  her  in  her  beautiful  house  in  Paris,  where  she 
received  in  a  most  stately  fashion.  She  drove  me  to 
Cimiez  and  about  Nice,  telling  me  of  the  curious  people 
who  came  there — kings,  queens,  Eussians  and  Ameri- 
cans. At  the  opera  she  pointed  out  the  Kussian  Grand 
Dukes  and  the  various  celebrities. 

The  only  amusement  I  found  in  Nice  was  to  buy 
flowers  to  send  to  my  friends  in  Paris  and  London,  and 
I  soon  went  on  to  Monte  Carlo,  which  has  a  far  more 
tranquil  climate,  and  is  sheltered  from  the  winds  which 
make  Nice  trying  to  the  rheumatic.  I  had  the  good 
fortune  to  find  tlie  man-of-war  Lancaster  at  Nice,  under 
the  care  of  Admiral  Earl  English,  and  some  friends  of 
mine  asked  for  invitations  for  us  to  an  entertainment 
on  board.  The  harbor  of  Yillefranche,  where  the  ship 
lay,  was  meant  for  this  sort  of  thing,  and  the  young 
ladies  of  my  party  enjoyed  a  dance  with  the  officers, 
while  I  sat  looking  up  at  those  splendid  mountains  and 
talking  to  the  Admiral  of  the  various  naval  reminis- 
cences which  that  most  lovely  bay  brought  up,  from 
Charles  II.  of  Anjou,  of  the  thirteenth  century,  down 
to  the  present  moment ;  and,  again,  to  an  English  geol- 
ogist of  the  "  metamorphic  conglomerate "  and  of  the 


286  AN   EPISTLE  TO   POSTERITY 

"dolomized  coral-rag,"  which,  he  informed  me,  filled 
the  mistral  with  dust,  a  great  deal  of  which  I  had  in 
my  eyes  at  that  moment. 

The  orange  groves,  the  lemon  groves,  the  endless 
flowers  and  palms,  the  cactus  by  the  wayside — all  the 
surpassing  beauty  of  Nice  and  the  Kiviera  does  not 
make  up  for  that  mistral.  I  was  glad  to  leave  it  and 
depart  by  the  noble  Corniche  road  for  San  Kemo. 

Keturning  another  year,  I  pitched  my  moving  tent  at 
Monte  Carlo. 

"  Monte  Carlo  is  Paradise,  with  a  bit  of  t'other  place 
in  it,"  said  a  Scotch  doctor.  If  there  is  anything  so  ro- 
mantic as  that  castle-palace-fortress  of  Monaco  I  have 
not  seen  it.  If  there  is  anything  more  delicious  than 
the  lovely  terraces  and  villas  of  Monte  Carlo  I  do  not 
wish  to  see  them.  There  is  nothing  beyond  the  semi- 
tropical  vegetation,  the  projecting  promontories  into  the 
Mediterranean,  the  all-embracing  sweep  of  the  ocean, 
the  olive  groves,  and  the  enchanting  climate  I  One  gets 
tired  of  the  word  beautiful. 

The  idea  that  one  must  gamble  at  Monte  Carlo  is 
an  exploded  one.  The  music  is  perfect ;  morning  and 
evening  concerts.  The  hotels  are  superb,  and  of  all 
prices  to  suit  all  purses.  I  tried  the  Hotel  Continental, 
kept  by  a  London  company,  and  found  it  perfectly  sat- 
isfactory. The  Prince  of  Wales  was  enjoying  the  best 
hospitality  of  a  friend,  but  came  to  that  hotel  to  see  the 
family  of  Lord  Salisbury,  who  at  the  time  was  building 
at  Beaulieu.  And  the  marble  terraces  of  this  hotel  were 
most  bewilderingly  bright.  At  five  o'clock  afternoon  tea 
was  served  in  the  great  hall  by  a  wood  fire  (for  it  was  not 
too  warm),  and  there,  with  Punch  in  my  hand,  surround- 
ed by  English  comfort,  with  some  newly  arrived  Ameri- 
can friends,  I  felt  that  I  had  reached  a  very  good  place. 


A   SAD    LOSS   TO   THE   AMERICAN   COLONY  237 

Monte  Carlo,  I  found,  was  the  home  of  many  half-pay 
officers'  widows  of  strict  evangelical  views,  who  could 
hire  pretty  villas  very  cheap,  and  who  led  serene  and 
respectable  lives  cheek  by  jowl  with  others  who  did 
not.  I  should  judge  that  it  was  the  favorite  resort 
also  of  spotted  reputations,  and  in  the  gay  atria  of  the 
gambling-rooms  one  meets  every  shade,  from  bluest  blue 
reputation  to  rather  violent  yellow.  As  a  winter  home 
for  a  rheumatic  it  is  without  a  parallel — the  best — for 
beauty  and  pleasure  incomparable,  and,  as  we  carry  our 
characters  with  us,  I  do  not  know  why  any  one  should 
not  go  there. 

Although  I  had  made  many  excursions  with  the 
duchess  at  Nice,  and  many  with  my  kind  friend  Mr. 
Junius  Morgan  at  Monte  Carlo,  including  the  fasci- 
nating drive  to  Turbia,  one  thousand  feet  above  the 
sea,  where  I  thought  I  had  capped  the  climax  with  that 
splendid  view  embracing  Monaco,  Mentone,  and  the  Med- 
iterranean, I  soon  found  that  that  was  surpassed  by  the 
further  beauties  of  the  Corniche  road.  This  last  is,  I 
think,  more  satisfactory  than  any  drive  on  the  Conti- 
nent, if  we  except  the  Simplon  Pass  and  the  drive  from 
Aix-les-Bains  to  the  Grande  Chartreuse.  I  should  have 
gone  back  to  Monte  Carlo  on  every  subsequent  visit  to 
Europe  but  that  I  was  intensely  shocked  by  the  acci- 
dental death  of  Junius  S.  Morgan,  Esq.,  the  head  of  the 
great  banking-house  in  London,  and  my  friend  of  many 
years'  standing.  Pie  had  asked  me  to  tea  on  a  certain 
Wednesday,  and  I  inquired  the  way  to  a  friend's  villa 
at  Beaulieu,  I  think  it  was ;  he  told  me,  and  mentioned 
that  it  was  a  dangerous  place  for  horses,  as  the  rail- 
road came  out  suddenly  at  that  point.  The  next  day 
he  met  his  death  exactly  on  that  spot,  rising  in  his 
carriage  to  return  the  bow  of  a  friend  who  was  pass- 


238  AN   EPISTLE   TO   POSTERITY 

ing  in  the  cars.  This  sudden  taking  out  of  life  of  so 
valuable,  so  excellent,  and  so  agreeable  a  man  threw 
a  gloom  over  this  fascinating  spot  —  a  gloom  which 
made  me  anxious  to  leave  it,  and  I  have  never  seen  it 
since. 


CHAPTER   XIV 

Imperial  Rome  — The  American  Colony  — W.  W.  Story,  Bishop 
Whipple,  and  the  Terrys  —  My  Presentation  at  the  Italian 
Court— A  Ball  at  the  Quirinal  —  Lord  Houghton— Two  Val- 
entines— Modern  Rome — The  Vatican  Library  and  Gardens. 

EoME,  first,  last,  and  forever.  When  one  approaches 
the  Campagna  a  sudden  feeling  of  familiarity,  of  home, 
comes  over  one.  It  is  indescribable,  but  so  pronounced 
(I  have  heard  many  travellers  own  up  to  it)  that  I  think 
it  a  subject  for  psychical  research.  Whether  our  read- 
ing has  made  it  familiar,  and  that  the  pictures  in  the 
old  Penny  Magazine^  that  friend  of  my  childhood,  im- 
bued my  memory,  I  cannot  tell,  but  I  felt  no  astonish- 
ment as  that  tranquil  landscape  unfolded  itself;  the 
long,  Eoman-nosed  oxen  looked  like  familiar  friends. 
Had  I  been  there  in  a  previous  existence  ?  and,  if  so,  who 
was  I  ? 

We  took  up  our  quarters  (we  were  four  ladies  travel- 
ling together)  in  the  Hotel  di  Londra,  in  the  Piazza 
di  Spagna.  It  was  a  good  house  with  a  famous  cook, 
and  we  found  no  difficulty  in  getting  sunny  rooms. 
Indeed,  I  should  advise  any  new  traveller  to  go  to  this 
famous  square  for  a  week  at  least,  as  he  can  take  his 
bearings  there  better  than  in  any  spot  in  Eome.  It  is 
better  for  the  old  traditions,  and  very  convenient  for 
the  new  ones.  One  tastes  a  little  of  old  Eome  in  its 
atmosphere. 

I  had  for  friends  the  Storys,  while  Madame  la  Com- 


240  AN   EPISTLE   TO   POSTEEITY 

tesse  Gianotti  was  my  cousin.  Almost  every  street 
held  for  me  some  acquaintance.  Mr.  Astor  was  our 
minister ;  Mrs.  Carson,  a  very  famous  woman  of  South- 
ern birth,  the  daughter  of  the  celebrated  loyal  Mr.  Peti- 
grew,  of  Charleston,  and  who  had  lived  in  Kome  ten 
years,  practising  her  profession  as  an  artist,  was  a  most 
intimate  friend.  There  was  always  somebody  some- 
where to  help  me  to  begin  to  see  Rome  in  the  most 
useful,  time-saving  manner,  every  day,  and  every  hour 
of  every  day.  But  my  first  drives  were  alone.  I  went 
out  to  see  the  profile  of  Eome  by  myself. 

The  Castle  of  St.  Angelo,  the  Fountain  of  Trevi,  St. 
Peter's,  the  Forum,  the  Arch  of  Constantine,  Santa  Ma- 
ria Maggiore,  St.  John  Lateran  —  all  were  so  familiar 
that  I  felt  like  saying,  "  You  have  not  changed  much," 
and  so  of  the  Coliseum. 

But  when  I  drove  to  San  Pietro  in  Montorio  and  got 
that  splendid  view,  and  then  to  the  Borghese  Yilla  and 
to  the  Pincian  Hill,  I  began  to  feel  the  sublime  novelty 
of  Rome.  It  grew  grander,  larger,  more  strange  every 
day,  as  St.  Peter's  grows  larger.  I  lost  the  sense  of 
having  been  there  before ;  and  when  I  left  it,  my  senses 
swamped  by  its  immensity,  I  felt  that  I  had  never  seen 
it  at  all,  that  I  should  never  comprehend  its  infinite 
beauty,  grandeur.  And  as  to  its  lovely  drives  on  the 
Campagna,  to  the  tomb  of  Csecilia  Metella,  and  to  Al- 
bano,  they  grew  stranger  every  time ;  so  of  the  Traste- 
vere,  and  the  San  Paolo  fuori  le  Mura:  they  never 
seemed  natural.  Those  things  outside  of  Rome  never 
grew  familiar,  although  I  went  to  them  a  hundred 
times. 

And  the  Roman  people  were  always  new;  the  Yia 
del'  Amina,  the  Babuino,  the  Yia  Ripetta,  the  Piazza 
del  Popolo — all  these  crowded  streets  and  squares  were 


IMPERIAL    ROME  241 

ever  a  perpetual  surprise  and  astonishment.  The  Corso, 
with  its  thousand  balconies,  was  a  surprise.  I  had  im- 
agined it  a  circular  avenue  going  round  the  city,  instead 
of  a  straight  street,  only  a  mile  long. 

Somehow  the  Capitol  and  the  Vatican  did  not  look 
natural,  or  stand  in  the  right  places.  Nor  did  I  ever  get 
quite  used  to  the  Pantheon.  That  was  to  me  the  most 
gigantic,  unequalled,  and  grandly  mysterious  thing  of 
them  all.  I  went  to  a  splendid  ceremonial  there,  the 
anniversary  of  the  death  of  Victor  Emanuel,  and  with 
the  lights  flaring  in  the  old  torches  which  had  been 
used  for  the  worship  of  Hercules,  the  pomp  of  the  mod- 
ern army  of  King  Humbert,  the  clashing  of  cymbals, 
all  the  glory  of  a  military  mass,  and  then  the  singing 
of  the  papal  choir — with  all  Italy,  the  senate,  and  the 
Roman  people  joining  in — I  got  so  dreadfully  discon- 
nected as  to  time  that  I  gave  up  in  despair  for  a  few 
days,  and  went  to  the  San  Pietro  in  Vinculo  to  look  at 
the  "  Moses,"  think  of  Michael  Angelo,  tranquillize  my- 
self, and  recover  my  dates. 

There  is  this  trouble  in  Rome:  there  is  too  much. 
I  was  there  nearly  four  months,  working  all  the  time, 
with  immense  advantages,  but  I  came  away  with  hunger 
unappeased. 

The  Ghetto  had  not  then  been  cleaned  up.  I  went 
there  with  a  certain  satisfaction  (in  getting  away),  I 
went  to  the  Tiber  to  catch  glimpses  of  its  then  vanish- 
ing squalor,  on  the  picturesque  side  near  the  Bridge  of 
St.  Angelo.  I  went  to  look  at  the  villas,  inside  and 
outside,  and  to  all  the  palaces  where  I  could  see  a  pict- 
ure or  a  statue  renowned  in  song  or  story.  I  went  to 
the  Vatican  every  week,  without  making  any  impression 
upon  it — there  were  more  sculptures  every  time;  and 
finally  I  went  to  the  Quirinal  to  see  the  Queen,  and  I 


242  AN    EPISTLE  TO  POSTERITY 

went  into  society.  My  social  advantages  were  very 
great,  and  I  found  myself  at  Mrs.  Story's  almost  before 
my  trunks  were  unpacked. 

Mrs.  Story  was  a  power  in  Kome,  and  for  thirty  years 
made  her  house  a  charming  rendezvous  for  her  country 
people.  She  had  the  gift  of  exclusiveness,  so  that  it 
was  never  (as  the  houses  of  hospitable  entertainers  on 
the  Continent  are  apt  to  be)  abused  or  made  common. 
One  met  the  best  people  from  every  country  there.  Mr. 
Story  was  so  exceptionally  delightful  and  so  renowned 
as  an  artist  that  everybody  wanted  to  see  him.  He 
needed  a  wife  with  just  such  social  gifts  as  she  had. 
His  studio  on  certain  days  could  be  visited,  but  of  course 
every  one  was  taught  to  respect  his  hours  of  work.  He 
was  engaged  on  the  recumbent "  Cleopatra"  when  I  was 
in  Rome,  and  she  lay  in  the  clay  of  the  Tiber,  just  as 
brown  as  she  was  in  nature.     I  never  saw  her  in  marble. 

At  Mrs.  Story's  reception  I  met  Mrs.  Hickson  Field, 
who  asked  me  to  come  to  her  beautiful  house,  where  we 
breakfasted  in  an  oval  dining-room,  looking  out  on  the 
Coliseum ;  and  I  met  her  daughter,  the  Princess  Bran- 
caccio,  and  the  Prince,  a  I^eapolitan,  who  had  contrib- 
uted a  beautiful  gallery  of  pictures  to  this  charming 
house.  It  was  the  most  delightful  thing  to  go  to  the 
Palazzo  Field,  with  its  views  and  rich  decorations  and 
American  comforts,  with  all  of  old  Eome  about  it.  I 
met  foreign  ambassadors,  and  Eoman  princesses,  and 
English  ladies  of  rank,  and  the  American  colony,  and 
artists,  and  everybody  I  wished  to  see,  at  both  houses. 

And  above  all  delights  were  the  dinners  in  "Bohe- 
mia," to  which  Mrs.  Story  asked  me  often,  where  I  met 
only  her  own  family  and  perhaps  one  friend — dinners 
where  formality  was  exchanged  for  a  delicious  home 
life,  where  I  met  her  gifted  sons  and  daughter,  her 


MRS.  W.  STORY,  BISHOP  WHIPPLE,  AND  THE  TERRYS      243 

beautiful  daughter-in-law,  Mrs.  Waldo  Story,  and  at 
which  Mr.  Story  was  perhaps  more  essentially  himself 
than  elsewhere.  Iler  stately  son-in-law,  Signor  Peruzzi, 
would  tell  us  anecdotes  of  Victor  Emanuel,  in  whose 
intimate  service  he  had  passed  his  life.  The  conversation, 
w^hich  never  degenerated  into  gossip,  was  most  varied 
and  most  interesting. 

To  these  dinners  would  succeed  more  stately  and  grand 
dinners,  handsome  musicales,  and  more  general  recep- 
tions. Indeed,  I  mounted  the  somewhat  Alpine  heights 
of  the  Palazzo  Barberini  many  times  a  week,  and  wished 
that  they  were  not  so  very  high. 

One  breakfast  I  particularly  remember.  It  was  given 
to  Bishop  Whipple,  of  Minnesota,  who  had  come  to 
Rome  with  his  saintly  air  of  St.  Paul — a  most  noble 
presence.  Lord  Houghton  and  his  sister.  Lady  Gal  way, 
and  some  lesser  people  were  present,  and  Bishop  Whip- 
ple talked  of  his  Indians  and  of  General  Grant.  I  re- 
member he  said,  "  Grant  is  the  only  man  who  ever  kept 
his  promises  to  me  about  the  Indians."  His  stories 
deeply  impressed  Lord  Houghton,  and  when  we  were 
to  separate  he  bent  his  gray  head  for  the  bishop's  bless- 
ing. It  was  a  most  touching  scene  to  see  these  two 
celebrated  old  men  together,  and,  although  I  have  for- 
gotten many  of  the  other  entertainments,  I  alwaj^s  re- 
member this. 

Mrs.  Story  took  me  to  see  the  Princess  Massimo  on 
the  day  of  St.  Philip  Neri,  when  a  service  is  held  in  the 
chapel  of  that  antique  palazzo.  We  first  went  up  to  the 
chapel  through  the  cold  stone-walls  of  that  part  of  the 
palace  open  to  the  public ;  then  we  turned  aside  for  the 
private  apartments  of  the  Princess,  whom  I  found  most 
interesting.  She  was  the  daughter  of  the  Duchess  de 
Berri  by  her  second  marriage  to  Count  Lalli,  and  half- 


244  AN   EPISTLE   TO   POSTERITY 

sister  to  Henri  Cinq,  the  Count  de  Chambord.  She 
was  a  religious  and  dignified  woman,  most  interesting ; 
and  as  the  Prince,  her  husband,  was  first-cousin  to  the 
King  (their  mothers  having  been  sisters),  there  was  a 
curious  royal  appanage  about  the  children.  She,  through 
her  mother,  is  related  to  all  the  Bourbons.  But  I  be- 
lieve Prince  Massimo,  being  a  "  Black,"  did  not  call  on 
his  royal  cousin,  the  King,  at  the  Quirinal.  This  Palace 
Massimo  was  the  most  antique  thing  in  the  way  of  a 
dwelling-house  which  I  saw 

I  used  to  visit  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Terry  at  the  Palazzo 
Altemps.  Mrs.  Terry,  the  mother  of  Marion  Crawford 
and  the  sister  of  Mrs.  Julia  Ward  Howe,  had,  as  Mrs. 
Crawford,  in  her  youth,  pleased  my  youthful  fancy  as 
the  original  of  Crawford's  "  Flora,"  which  used  to  stand 
in  the  winter-garden  of  Mrs.  Haight's  house  in  Fifth 
Avenue.  I  knew  Crawford,  the  sculptor,  in  those  days. 
He  was  a  famous,  handsome  man,  with  an  Irish  temper- 
ament, most  attractive ;  and  I  happened  to  meet  him  i,n 
Washington  when  he  came  to  adjust  his  famous  sculpt- 
ures for  the  Capitol. 

Subsequent  events  have  made  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Terry  very 
dear  to  me.  She  is  so  perfect,  so  saintly  a  character,  that 
Mrs.  Carson  always  called  her  '^  Saint  TeresinaP  She 
was  just  bringing  out  her  youngest  daughter,  now  Mrs. 
Winthrop  Chanler,  and  was  most  hospitable.  I  often 
dined  with  them  at  the  Palazzo  Altemps,  which  had  a 
dramatic  staircase.  I  used  to  feel  that  if  I  were  of  suifi- 
cient  importance  I  might  be  murdered  on  it  some  dark 
night.  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Crawford,  just  married,  had  come 
to  be  near  her,  or  with  her,  and  I  can  never  forget  her 
happiness  in  them.  Mr.  Terry,  who  had  lived  much  of 
his  life  in  Rome,  was  an  amiable  gentleman,  who  never 
showed  his  fatigue,  if  he  felt  it,  at  my  innumerable  ques- 


MK.  TV.  W.  ASTOB  AND  HIS   WIFE  245 

tions.  He  was  a  great  diner  out,  and  often  my  neighbor. 
Added  to  his  fame  as  an  artist  was  his  social  talent ;  so 
the  Palazzo  Altemps  became  one  of  my  Roman  homes. 

With  grand  parties  and  excellent  dinners,  the  home 
of  our  minister,  Mr.  "W.  W.  Astor,  was  a  distinguished 
rally ing-place  for  Americans.  Mr.  Astor,  speaking  all 
languages  and  having  a  great  fortune,  could  and  did  live 
as  the  representative  of  our  great  country  ought  to  live 
in  every  foreign  city.  He  was  so  cultivated  and  had  lived 
so  much  in  Rome  when  he  was  studying  art  (for  he  is 
a  good  sculptor)  that  he  was  also  a  prince  of  cicerones. 
He  was  just  writmg  his  excellent  novel  of  Valentino,  in 
which,  as  one  of  his  American  critics  said,  "  he  had  at- 
tempted to  whitewash  the  Borgias,  and  had  taken  rather 
a  large  contract."     He  did  it  very  well,  however. 

His  beautiful  wife,  so  famous  for  her  Italian  eyes, 
was  a  great  favorite  with  the  Queen,  who  said  that  she 
outshone  the  Italian  beauties  in  their  own  style.  This 
gentle  creature,  so  modest  and  humble,  seemed  always 
to  be  shrinking  away  from  her  splendid  position,  and  to 
care  for  this  earth  and  its  grandeurs  very  little.  Her 
early,  unexpected  death  seemed  to  call  for  Cicero's  la- 
ment over  his  daughter. 

One  mounted  gladl}'-  the  famous  marble  stairs  of  the 
celebrated  Palazzo  Rospigliosi,  with  its  marble  busts  of 
the  emperors,  to  see  this  home  of  the  Astors.  I  used 
to  pause  on  the  stairs  for  breath,  and  to  see  how  much 
the  Roman  emperors  looked  liked  Americans.  Mr. 
Seward  was  Julius  Caesar  over  again. 

On  the  ground-floor  of  this  palace  is  the  famous  "  Au- 
rora "  of  Guido,  which  one  looks  at  in  a  mirror,  a  happy 
invention  to  save  one  from  craning  the  neck. 

I  also  remember  many  hospitalities  at  the  house  of 
Mr.  and  Mrs.  Hay  ward,  that  Palazzo  Rospoli,  with  its 


246  AN    EPISTLE   TO   POSTERITY 

beautiful  library,  and  also  at  the  home  of  Mr.  and  Mrs. 
Hazeltine,  enriched  with  American  comforts  and  the 
pictures  of  Mr.  Hazeltine,  an  old  friend,  dating  back  to 
the  Aurelian  days  in  New  York  —  the  days  of  Darley 
and  "Jack"  Ehninger,  Theodore  Winthrop,  Kensett, 
Gifford,  Eastman  Johnson,  Thomas  Hicks,  the  days  be- 
fore the  war.  There  were  many  other  old  friends  whose 
hospitalities  I  can  never  forget.  I  dined  with  Mr.  and 
]\Irs.  Hurlbert  at  the  Palazzo  Bonaparte,  in  the  very 
rooms  of  "Madame  Mere,"  on  Christmas-day,  1884. 
Mr.  and  Mrs.  Story  were  present,  also  Signor  and  Si- 
gnora  Peruzzi,  and  two  English  ladies  of  distinction. 
What  a  hospitable  and  agreeable  dinner  it  was !  and  of 
all  that  gay  company  I  believe  that  Mrs.  Lee,  Mrs. 
Hurlbert,  Signor  and  Signora  Peruzzi,  and  myself  alone 
survive. 

Mrs.  Lee  and  her  sister  were  very  much  envied  in 
Eome  because,  being  two  hostesses,  they  had  four  seats 
of  honor  at  their  dinners,  thus  making  the  terrible  ques- 
tion of  precedence  possible.  This  is  the  shadow  over 
the  life  of  a  Koman  hostess ;  for  it  was  impossible  to 
invite  certain  notabilities  together  because  each  had  a 
right  to  be  considered  first. 

Certain  princes  in  Kome  go  back  to  Eomulus  and 
Remus,  and  there  is  even  a  question  as  to  which  twin 
received  from  their  savage  mother,  the  wolf,  the  greater 
quantity  of  that  heroic  nutriment  which  is  supposed  to 
have  given  them  their  superiority. 

The  time  came  when  I  was  to  be  presented  to  the 
Queen,  and  as  I  was  in  deep  mourning  I  did  not  know 
how  to  meet  the  great  subject  of  dress.  I  was  told  that 
I  must  not  appear  in  black,  for  the  Queen  was  super- 
stitious ;  so  I  wrote  to  Paris  for  a  court  dress.  It  got 
snowed  up  on  the  frontier  and  only  appeared  for  the 


MY   PKESENTATION   AT  THE   ITALIAN   COURT  247 

court  ball,  so  that  I  had  to  disguise  a  black  velvet  with 
roses  and  old  lace  for  the  cerde.  That  black  velvet  was 
"  butchered  to  make  a  Koman  holiday." 

Presentation  in  Rome  is  a  far  more  easy  and  social 
function  than  in  England.  In  the  first  place,  it  is  held 
in  the  evening,  when  one  is  ready  to  be  in  full  dress,  and 
it  is  a  great  pleasure  to  go  to  the  Quirinal  to  see  its 
ceilings  (painted  by  Domenichino),  the  splendid  military 
guard,  and  the  grand  staircase,  and  servants  in  scarlet, 
which  they  tell  me  is  "  royal  purple."  I  had  received 
two  cards,  one  of  which  I  gave  up  to  Prince  Yicovara, 
the  handsomest  man  of  the  period,  and  the  other  one  I 
have  in  my  pocket  to-day.  Prince  Yicovara  delivered 
me  over  to  Madame  Yillamarina,  the  Queen's  first  lady 
in  waiting,  who  received  me  most  cordially  and  asked 
me  to  stand  with  my  countrywomen,  who  were  in  a 
group  at  the  end  of  the  grand  salon.  There  were  per- 
haps a  hundred  ladies  and  gentlemen  in  the  room.  I 
noticed  near  the  door  the  two  American  princesses, 
Yicovara  and  Brancaccio.  We  were  very  proud  of 
those  two  ladies;  for  beauty  and  chic  they  could  not 
be  surpassed. 

They  were  seated  chatting  with  each  other,  when, 
after  fifteen  minutes,  we  saw  them  rise  and  courtesy 
deeply  to  a  little  figure  that  entered  quietly.  It  was 
the  Queen. 

She  turned  a  moment  towards  the  Marchioness  Yil- 
lamarina, who  whispered  in  her  ear.  Then  the  Queen 
commenced  walking  slowly  around  the  inner  circle, 
speaking  to  every  one  a  few  words.  As  she  came  near 
each  one  Madame  Yillamarina  read  the  name,  from  a 
paper  she  held  in  her  hand,  quietly  in  her  ear. 

When  she  came  near  me  I  distinctly  heard  my  own 
name  and  that  of  Count  Gianotti,  who  had  procured 


248  AN   EPISTLE   TO   POSTERITY 

me  my  introduction,  so  I  knew  that  her  Majesty  was 
being  prompted.  I  was  astonished,  however,  at  the 
memory  she  showed,  asking  me  about  Mr.  Marsh,  our 
former  minister,  and  American  literature;  inquiring 
how  long  I  should  stay  in  Kome,  whether  or  not  I 
found  much  time  to  write,  etc.,  all  in  the  most  gra- 
cious manner  and  in  excellent  English.  After  she 
had  passed  on  the  Marchioness  Yillaraarina  came  back 
and  said  to  me,  "  We  shall  hope  to  see  you  on  Thurs- 
day evening;  and  as  I  know  you  have  an  engagement 
this  evening,  her  Majesty  regards  it  as  proper  for  all 
who  wish  to  take  their  leave  to  do  so,  or  at  any  rate  to 
be  seated." 

This  was  most  thoughtful ;  so,  after  seeing  her  lovely 
Majesty  go  the  rounds  of  our  room  and  pass  in  to  an- 
other, we  left  for  a  ball  w^hich  was  given  for  some 
charity  by  the  princesses,  where  we  met  a  most  dis- 
tinguished set  of  Eoman  dignitaries. 

On  Thursday  came  the  court  ball.  Fortunately  my 
dress  was  released  by  the  snows  and  the  custom-house, 
and  I  had  the  pleasure  of  attending  two  of  those  really 
delightful  royal  functions — a  court  ball  at  the  Quirinal. 

There  is  something  home -like  and  caressante  about 
the  Queen,  even  in  her  hours  of  state ;  she  is  always  a 
beautifully  dressed  person,  and  wears  the  most  magnifi- 
cent jewels,  but  she  still  seems,  in  spite  of  her  rank, 
near  and  dear.  Her  smile  is  infinitely  charming  and 
sympathetic.  When  she  entered  the  ballroom  leaning 
on  the  arm  of  the  King  and  preceded  by  Count  Gianotti, 
who  was  the  prefect  of  the  palace,  and  all  her  ladies 
and  gentlemen — a  truly  royal  cortege — we  all  stood  up, 
and  waited  as  she  ascended  a  little  dais  under  a  royal 
taldacchino.  She  bowed  five  times  —  first  to  the  am- 
bassadors, then  to  the  senate,  then  to  the  army,  then  to 


A  BALL   AT  THE   QUIRINAL  249 

the  Eoman  nobility,  and  finally  to  all  of  us,  her  guests ; 
and  she  did  it  with  such  grace  and  smiling  amiability 
that  she  became  one  of  us.  Then  Gianotti  formed  the 
royal  quadrille,  through  which  she  walked  with  Baron 
Keudal,  the  dean  of  the  diplomatic  corps.  The  King 
v/ill  not  dance ;  he  says  he  feels  "  like  a  fish  out  of  water 
at  a  ball !"  Poor  King !  But  he  stands  around,  looking 
very  kingly;  occasionally  speaking  to  a  lady,  but  gen- 
erally talking  to  an  officer  who,  is  on  duty  near  him. 
The  most  democratic,  kindly,  simple,  but  grand  little 
man,  with  a  noble  head  and  face,  and  as  full  of  courage 
as  a  lion. 

Royalty  retired  before  supper,  but  we  were  taken  into 
an  exceedingly  grand  room,  where  we  had  a  most  in- 
viting supper.  I  remember  eating  a  truffle  which  was 
as  large  as  a  potato  and  very  black.  I  was  told  by  the 
Marquis  della  Stuff  a  tbat  they  were  from  the  forests 
where  the  King  hunted  the  wild  boar,  and  were  rooted 
out  by  his  dogs.  The  housekeeping  at  the  Quirinal  is 
excellent.  One  of  the  marks  of  the  almost  village-like 
character  of  Rome  was  shown  by  the  fact  that  after 
these  balls  the  bonbons  and  delicacies  left  over  are 
sent  around  to  the  court.  I  remember  eating,  at  one 
of  Countess  Gianotti's  dinners,  some  wild  boar  which 
the  King  had  shot,  and  seeing,  at  another  house,  a 
magnificent  bird  pie  which  had  come  from  the  Qui- 
rinal. 

The  only  house,  I  think,  where  the  King  and  Queen 
visited  was  that  of  Baron  Keudal,  the  German  Ambas- 
sador. There  were  some  reasons  of  state  why  they 
should  do  so.  I  was  very  glad  to  have  been  invited 
to  this  ball  and  to  have  seen  the  Queen,  who  made  her- 
self delightfully  genial  and  agreeable,  speaking  to  many 
ladies  and  walking  about  generally.    After  her  depart- 


250  AN   EPISTLE   TO   POSTEEITY 

ure  there  seemed  to  be  an  end  of  everything.  She  took 
the  gayety  with  her. 

I  went  to  another  ball  at  the  Quirinal,  and  to  one  at 
the  English  Embassy,  and  to  one  at  the  house  of  Prince 
Orsini,  head  of  the  "  Blacks,"  the  Pope's  first  subject ; 
dinners  and  teas  innumerable. 

There  came  into  my  life  just  then  the  English  "Hugh 
Conway,"  or  Ferdinand  J.  Fargus,  who  wrote  Called 
BacJc,  a  novel  which  had  such  a  spurt  of  popularity  that 
it  made  him  rich  in  a  day.  He  and  his  wife  were  sin- 
gularly nice  young  English  people,  who  talked  much  of 
their  children,  and  I  used  to  enjoy  having  them  come 
to  dine  and  spend  the  evening  with  me.  I  remember 
him  at  the  great  ball  at  the  English  Embassy,  and  he 
told  me  it  was  the  first  grand  ball  he  had  ever  seen. 
They  left,  went  to  Naples,  where  he  caught  the  fever; 
however,  he  got  better,  and  wrote  me  a  long,  beautiful 
letter,  which  I  have  still.  Then  he  had  a  relapse  and 
died.  This  letter  was  sent  to  me  by  his  wife,  with  the 
afflicting  enclosure,  "  He  is  dead !  he  is  dead !" 

"With  Mrs.  Carson  I  used  to  go  to  the  galleries,  where 
she  sat  copying  pictures,  and  where  she  told  me  (for 
she  was  an  inimitable  raconteur)  the  stories  of  Eoman 
life.  She  was  in  a  great  trouble  always  about  Miss 
Brewster,  with  whom  she  had  a  feud,  for  she  had  her 
own  favorites,  and  those  who  were  not  such.  She  told 
me  much  about  the  fine  old,  witty,  blind  Duke  of  Ser- 
raonota,  whom  at  one  time  all  Kome  thought  she  would 
marry.  That  man  of  infinite  accomplishments,  of  whom 
some  one  said  it  was  a  great  good  fortune  to  him  that 
he  was  blind,  for  it  gave  him  time  to  read  his  own  mind, 
was  the  most  famous  man  in  Rome  as  a  wit  and  an  art 
critic. 

It  was  this  witty  duke  who  wrote  the  squibs  which 


GALLERIES   OF  THE  PALAZZO   BORGHESE  251 

Marforio  presented  to  the  Roman  world  every  morning — 
that  sort  of  secret  telegraph  of  what  everybody  thought 
yet  no  one  dared  to  say.  They  had  to  move  Marforio's 
gossip  away,  because  it  grew  too  severe,  and  told,  alas ! 
too  many  truths  about  Church  and  State. 

The  galleries  of  the  Palazzo  Borghese,  with  Mrs.  Car- 
son and  Mr.  Terry  as  cicerones,  was  again  an  opening 
of  the  fountains  of  memory  and  of  reading.  In  my 
youth  no  traveller  ever  came  honae  from  Europe,  espe- 
cially from  Eome,  without  bringing  copies  of  its  famous 
masterpieces.  The  splendid  portrait  of  Caesar  Borgia 
by  Brouzino,Domenichino's  "Carmen  Sybil,"  Correggio's 
"  Danae,"  with  the  Cupids  shaping  arrows ;  Titian's 
"  Sacred  and  Profane  Love,"  "  David  and  Goliath," 
"Christ  and  the  Mother  of  Zebedee's  Children,"  were 
old  friends ;  but  there  was  plenty  else  to  see  that  had 
not  come  to  Boston.  Much  remains  in  Rome  un- 
copied. 

To  study  this  gallery  with  Mrs.  Carson  was  a  liberal 
education,  and  then  to  go  home  with  her  to  a  dinner,  in 
the  Yia  Quattro  Fontane,  and  to  eat  dishes  prepared  by 
her  Italian  cook,  the  husband  of  Esterina,  her  maid,  to 
whom  she  had  once  given  this  advice :  "  Go  and  marry 
a  cook,  Esterina,  and  be  sure  you  marry  a  good  cook." 
Esterina  had  obeyed  her  mistress.  She  gave  me  truly 
Roman  dishes. 

In  my  visits  to  the  Vatican  I  had  the  great  good  fort- 
une to  fall  in  with  James  Jackson  Jarvis,  a  distinguished 
art  critic,  who  had  lived  and  studied  art  in  Italy  for 
twenty  years.  He  saved  me  those  enormously  long 
walks  one  takes  who  is  exploring,  and  took  me  directly 
to  the  gems,  and  to  his  family,  who  were  devout  Catho- 
lics, while  to  Monsignor  Cataldi  I  owed  the  little  I  saw 
of  the  Papal  Court  and  the  ceremonials  in  the  Sistine 


253  AN   EPISTLE   TO   POSTERITY 

Chapel.    But  the  Pope  was  very  busy  that  winter,  and 
I  did  not  have  the  honor  of  kissing  his  hand. 

I  stayed  in  Kome  through  the  "  Christian  year  " — from 
before  Christmas  until  after  Easter — and  tasted  all  varie- 
ties of  the  Koman  climate.  It  was  a  very  fine  winter, 
beginning  with  some  remarkable  rains,  which  caused  an 
overflow  of  the  Tiber,  which  is,  I  believe,  always  a  guar- 
antee of  good  weather  later.  People  went  out  to  Tre 
Fontane  on  a  boat,  and  the  Apollo  Theatre  was  not  ap- 
proachable for  a  week ;  but  as  the  flood  subsided  it  be- 
came very  warm  and  serene — charming  weather  for  ex- 
cursions to  Albano  and  Tivoli. 

My  friends  the  Osgood  -  Fields  took  me  from  their 
beautiful  apartment  in  the  Colonna  Palace  into  the 
splendid  gallery  and  garden  of  that  noted  place,  and  I 
began  to  study  the  Roman  garden.  How  the  Banksia 
roses  fell  in  cataracts  over  the  wall!  how  select  were 
those  terraces,  and  how  aristocratic  those  old  ilex  trees ! 
how  proudly  pompous  the  firs !  What  a  union  of  old 
marbles  and  young  flowers !  Here  the  present  coquetted 
with  the  past.  A  lion  with  open  mouth  would  be  au- 
daciously embraced  by  an  undismayed  honeysuckle,  and 
violets  would  half  cover  the  feet  of  a  Roman  senator. 

They  were  golden  afternoons  when  we  drove  on  the 
Pincian  Hill  to  see  the  Queen  flashing  by  with  her  scarlet 
liveries,  or  when  we  picked  anemones  in  the  Pamphili 
Doria.  There  was  never  diein  perdidi  to  write  in  our 
journal.  It  was  all  success,  and  then  came  in  my  last 
best  piece  of  good  fortune.  Lord  Houghton  and  Lady 
Galway  had  come  early  to  my  hotel  and  added  im- 
mensely to  my  pleasure.  They  had  known  Rome  as 
boy  and  girl.  Lady  Galway  told  me  she  had  gone  to 
her  first  ball  in  the  Barberini  Palace  in  the  old  days  of 
Papal  magnificence,  that  splendor  which  she  always  re- 


A  VALENTINE  FROM  LOED  HOUGHTON        253 

gretted.  I  can  hardlj  speak  of  these  two  dear  friends, 
they  were  so  kind  to  me.  Lord  Houghton  took  me  to 
the  grave  of  Keats,  and  told  me  to  write  in  my  journal 
that  I  had  stood  with  him  by  those  precious  ashes.  It 
was  the  8th  of  March,  and  the  grass  was  full  of  violets. 
He  said, "  If  I  had  died  in  Egypt,  as  I  ought  to  have 
done,  I  should  have  been  laid  here  by  his  side,  and  then 
Keats  would  have  been  defended  by  his  biographer  on 
one  side  and  the  man  who  painted  his  portrait  and 
soothed  his  dying  pillow  [Severn]  on  the  other." 

To  meet  Lord  Houghton  in  Mr.  Story's  studio  while 
he  was  sitting  for  his  bust  was  a  most  historical  experi- 
ence. The  famous  poet  and  man  of  society,  Eichard 
Monckton  Milnes,  did  not  lose  his  greatness  when  he  be- 
came Lord  Houghton.  His  kind  heart,  his  genial  tem- 
perament, kept  him  a  boy  to  the  last.  His  sister.  Lady 
Galway,  who  adored  him,  always  called  him  "  Dicke}'-," 
and  used  to  prompt  us  to  make  him  read  his  own  verses 
and  even  to  write  them. 

"  JSTow,  write  Mrs.  Sherwood  a  valentine,  Dickey,"  said 
she,  on  February  14,  1885. 

And  I  added  my  entreaties;  so  that  evening  came 
down-stairs  this  pretty  trifle : 

"A  lettered  lady  of  Kew  York  demands 
A  poem  from  old  Yorkshire's  trembling  hands; 
Herself  impervious  to  the  touch  of  time, 
She  thinks  he  can  repeat  his  early  rhyme. 
He  might  as  well  endeavor  to  recall, 
Amid  this  foolish  pomp  of  carnival, 
The  ancient  triumph  of  the  Roman  brave, 
The  simple  clown  and  moralizing  slave  ; 
Rebind  the  ancient  bond  of  grace  and  awe, 
Virgilian  metres  and  Justinian  law. 
No !  'mid  the  din  forget  that  grand  repose, 
And  rest  content  with  Italy — and  prose  1" 


254  AN   EPISTLE   TO   POSTERITY 

This  was  not  bad  poetry  for  a  man  of  eighty.  This 
last  sonnet  of  Lord  Houghton  was  read  at  every  dinner 
in  Eome  that  spring.  I  told  Mr.  Story  the  day  would 
be  incomplete  unless  I  also  secured  a  valentine  from  him, 
and  he  sent  me  the  following  graceful  verses. 

"A  VALENTINE. 

"A  rhythmic  cadence  all  the  livelong  Eight 
Has  moved  within  me  as  I  sleepless  lay — 
Now  like  a  song  that  from  some  bending  spray 

A  glad  bird  carols  quick,  and  then  takes  flight; 

Now  to  a  dancing  measure,  gay  and  bright ; 
Now  to  a  serious  strain,  as  sad  and  gray 
As  the  cold  breath  of  morning  ere  the  day 

Has  fused  the  horizon  with  its  earliest  light. 

For  while  I  dreamed  I  ever  sang  to  thee. 
Whom  this  glad  morning  makes  my  Valentine, 

And,  borne  along  a  dim  ideal  sea. 
Our  spirits  sailed  to  music  far  and  fine. 

But  now  the  day  has  come,  the  dreaming  done, 

And  of  those  songs  to  thee  I  have  not  one. 

'*W.  W.  Story. 
*'Feb,  14,1885." 

The  recumbent  statue  of  Cleopatra  in  the  clay  lay  in 
the  studio.  "  It  must  be  like  talking  to  the  woman  you 
love  to  work  on  that  clay,"  said  Lord  Houghton.  This 
interview  was  one  of  the  many  pleasures  I  owed  to 
Story.  But  he  was  at  his  best,  this  variously  gifted 
man,  in  taking  me  to  some  half-ruined  temple  or  some 
old  villa,  or  to  the  unearthing  of  some  antique  square, 
where  he  would  point  out  a  statue  which  had  once  been 
colored,  or  a  mozaic  floor,  and  dilate  on  the  magnifi- 
cence of  the  old  Roman  life.  He  would  point  out  to 
me  how  a  wide  corridor  and  gallery  adorned  with 
marble  statues  had  led  into  a  spacious  atrium,  and  we 
would  try  to  fill  it  with  Livia  and  her  maidens.     "  Oh," 


LOKD   HOUGHTON   AND   LADY   GALWAY  255 

said  he,  "  how  can  frivolous  people  walk  over  a  dead 
city,  under  their  feet,  without  a  stir  at  the  heart  ?" 

The  Carapagna  was,  however,  his  dream  and  his  de- 
light ;  next  best  he  loved  the  Trastevere  quarter,  where 
some  old  Eoman  traits  still  linger.  He  objected  to  the 
absence  of  costume,  of  old  shows  like  the  cardinals' 
carriages,  the  dying  out  of  the  Befana  at  Christmas ; 
he  sought  out  the  Piffarari  and  wrote  down  their  songs. 
He  bewailed  the  nineteenth  century  in  Rome. 

I  have  letters  from  Lord  Houghton  dating  back  to 
1869,  when  he  had  entertained  us  at  breakfast  with 
many  distinguished  people.  Indeed,  so  famous  was  he 
for  these  breakfasts  that  Lady  Gal  way,  on  being  asked  if 
a  certain  murderer  was  to  be  hanged  that  day,  answered, 
"  Yes,  unless  he  is  breakfasting  with  Dickey !" 

It  was  charming  to  hear  the  brother  and  sister  quar- 
rel over  politics,  Lady  Galway  being  a  great  Tory. 
"My  sister's  political  belief  is  founded  on  profound 
ignorance,"  he  would  say. 

"  Well,  Dickey,  what  yours  is  founded  on  no  man  can 
tell,"  she  responded. 

They  had  been  in  Italy  in  their  youth,  went  to  their 
first  ball  there,  and  both  spoke  Italian  perfectly.  To 
them  I  owe  my  sight  of  a  princely  family  with  whom 
they  were  intimate  at  home.  It  was  a  replica  of  Sara- 
scenesca. 

Some  day  I  may  publish  these  letters  of  Lord  Hough- 
ton. They  are  worthy  of  Horace  Walpole,  and  full  of 
the  most  Avitty  mots  and  anecdotes  of  the  royal  family 
back  to  George  lY.,  and  of  the  aristocracy  of  Great 
Britain. 

Whoever  it  was  that  allowed  the  nineteenth  century 
to  enter  Rome  committed  an  irretrievable  blunder.  The 
practical  commonplace  century  makes  but  a  poor  show 


256  AN   EPISTLE  TO   POSTERITY 

here  compared  with  his  earlier  brethren.  They  have 
all  left  something  wonderful  to  see  —  the  Coliseum,  the 
Fountain  of  Trevi,  the  Pantheon,  the  Forum,  the  Capi- 
tol, the  Column  of  Trajan,  many  a  nameless  ruin,  many 
a  temple  of  the  gods,  many  a  palace  and  garden,  many 
a  lofty  church — while  the  nineteenth  century  has  noth- 
ing to  offer  but  the  Yia  l^azionale,  a  commonplace 
street  of  a  fourth-rate  French  town.  An  iconoclasm 
equal  to — nay,  far  greater  than — that  of  Haussmann, 
this  stucco  street  takes  its  broad  impertinence  through 
the  wrecks  of  old  palaces.  Sad  but  inevitable  law  of 
change!  The  modern  Goth  called  Improvement  goes 
about  swinging  his  stick  and  hammers  his  way  through 
the  splendid  work  of  ages.  Time,  the  prince  of  sculp- 
tors, leaves  beautiful  ruins  behind  him,  with  the  pathos 
of  gray  hairs  hanging  about  them ;  but  improvement 
makes  a  botchy  work  of  it — such  ruin  as  a  fool  makes. 
Such  noble  rooms,  such  splendid  frescoes,  such  pictu- 
resque balconies,  go  at  every  sweep  of  the  architect's 
pencil !  I  look  upon  the  advent  of  the  nineteenth  century 
in  Eome  with  the  deepest  disdain,  and  yet  I  fear  the 
young  giant  is  indifferent  to  my  contempt.  But  there  is 
one  old  institution  that  still  does  as  his  sovereign  will 
suggests.  'No  emperor  or  king,  nor  even  century,  can 
affect  the  Tiber;  he  still  is  sluggish  or  angry  as  he 
pleases.  We  have  seen  him  in  a  boiling  rage.  The  si- 
rocco melted  an  avalanche  up  in  the  mountains,  and  sent 
the  old  monarch  down  to  Eome  with  trees  and  rocks  in 
his  foaming  embrace,  and  wildly  did  he  invade  even  the 
Pantheon,  where  Victor  Emanuel  lies,  while  the  monks 
muttered  prayers  and  said  masses  for  the  repose  of  his 
soul.  The  angry  water-spirits  came  to  that  service,  but 
they  stopped  their  din,  as  if  they  too  had  respected — 
as  all  Rome  did — the  i?^  Galantuomo,    Three  days  and 


ITALIAN  PALACES   AND  AMERICAN   CONVENIENCES       257 

nights  of  incessant  rain  were  added  to  this  avalanche, 
and  the  Kivetta  became  flooded.  We  were  asked  to  go 
to  the  Apollo  Theatre,  but  the  street  in  front  of  it  became 
impassable,  so  the  very  poor  opera  of  Lalcme  was  aban- 
doned. The  great  bridge  of  St.  Angelo  seemed  to  be 
almost  imperilled.  The  lower  part  of  the  Ghetto  was 
flooded  and  its  human  rats  swept  out.  The  Yia  della 
Lungara  was  flooded,  and  the  whole  of  the  new  Tiber 
embankment  from  Ponte  Sisto  to  the  Ponte  Quatro 
Capi  was  under  water.  To  one  who  knows  Kome, 
even  slightly,  these  geographical  landmarks  will  show 
what  a  sudden  and  dangerous  rise  was  that  of  the  tur- 
bulent river.  This  was  on  the  13th  of  January,  1885. 
To-day,  the  20th,  the  waters  have  subsided ;  a  rich  Ko- 
man  sunshine  bathes  the  city,  the  once  flooded  spot  ex- 
tending from  near  the  Yicolo  San  Giacomo  to  the  Pa- 
lazzo Borghese  is  dry,  and  the-  human  rats  have  crept 
back  to  their  holes.  The  tramontana,  a  cold  wind  from 
the  mountains,  has  swept  the  streets  dry. 

The  discomfort  of  even  rich  Italians  seems  to  us 
great,  and  we  admire  most  those  Roman  palaces  into 
which  has  crept  something  of  American  conveniences. 
We  rejoice  on  coming  across  carpets,  Franklin  stoves, 
furnaces,  wood  fires,  and  easy-chairs,  even  Boston  rock- 
ing-chairs. Then  we  begin  to  appreciate  the  frescoes, 
the  immense  and  splendid  rooms,  and  the  vastness  of  it 
all,  for  nothing  on  this  earth  built  for  the  habitation  of 
man  was  ever  so  vast  as  an  old  Italian  palace,  or  so 
noble!  The  rich  and  the  poor  together  always  look 
cold.  The  poor  are  always  ragged  and  dirty,  in  very 
picturesque  clothes,  and  on  their  poor  shoes  lies  the 
earth  of  the  Lacustrine  period.  And  yet  what  a  privi- 
lege it  is  to  be  even  a  beggar  in  Rome !  I  thought  so 
when  at  St.  Peter's  I  heard  Cardinal  Howard  sing  the 

17 


258  AN  EPISTLE   TO   POSTEEITY 

mass  on  St.  Peter's  Day.  He  is  a  splendid,  great  life- 
guardsman,  seven  feet  high,  I  should  think,  with  the 
proud  English  upper  lip  of  his  proud  English  race — these 
Howards  to  whom  Pope  paid  a  noble  compliment : 

"What  can  ennoble  fools,  or  sots,  or  cowards? 
Alas,  not  all  the  noble  blood  of  all  the  Howards  !" 

Cardinal  Howard  is  a  stately  prince  of  the  Church, 
and  most  admired  by  the  English  ladies  here,  who,  it  is 
said,  kiss  the  hem  of  his  garments.  He  wears  very 
handsome  garments  for  them  to  kiss.  On  the  occasion 
of  this  splendid  ceremony  the  choir  of  the  Sistine  Chapel 
answered  antiphonally  the  choir  of  the  cathedral.  The 
famous  tenors  sang  their  best,  and  so  did  the  sopranos 
of  St.  John  Lateran ;  and  no  such  music  was  ever  heard  * 
in  all  the  world  outside  of  Eome.  In  front  of  me  stood 
two  little  beggar  brothers,  no  covering  on  their  curly 
heads.  They  were  enraptured  with  the  music,  as  they 
well  might  be,  and  shamed  my  Protestant  coolness  by 
kneeling  and  crossing  themselves  in  the  right  places. 
They  were  very  much  in  my  way,  and  they  smelt  of 
poverty  and  garlic;  but  I  envied  them — for  they  can 
always  see  this  Rome,  while  I  must  leave  it.  I  gave 
them  a  small  copper  tribute  of  respect,  and  of  gratitude 
that  they  had  taught  me  how  rich  a  beggar  might  be. 
They  rewarded  me  with  a  smile  Raphael  might  have 
coveted,  and  a  compliment  in  Italian,  far  sweeter  than 
anything  I  have  ever  heard  in  English. 

We  went  the  next  day  to  hear  a  grand  funeral  mass 
in  honor  of  the  Duchess  Torlonia.  The  church,  St. 
Lorenzo  in  Lucino,  was  draped  in  black  and  gold,  and 
all  the  Roman  aristocracy  were  present.  Several  prin- 
cesses of  the  Bonaparte  family  were  there,  and  pre- 
sented striking  likenesses  to  that  wonderful  face  of 


THE   VATICAN   LIBRARY  259 

Napoleon  I.  The  music  was  again  splendid,  and  we 
heard  the  renowned  tenor  of  the  Sistine  Chapel,  whose 
fame  is  European. 

Perhaps  one  of  the  most  famous  days  of  sight-see- 
ing was  that  which  we  gave  to  the  Vatican  Library-, 
which,  not  being  often  shown  to  strangers,  may  be 
worthy  of  a  few  words  of  description.  I  received  espe- 
cial permission  from  Monsignor  Cataldi,  and  we  were 
taken  there  by  a  chamberlain  of  the  Pope,  who  was 
able  with  this  important  card  to  obtain  entrance  for  us 
to  the  rooms,  and  access  to  the  rarely  seen  manuscripts. 
It  is  a  wonderful  series  of  rooms,  magnificently  fres- 
coed, and  containing  the  gifts  of  sovereigns.  These 
rooms  are  rich  in  vases,  tables  of  malachite,  statues,  col- 
umns of  Oriental  alabaster,  objets  cPart,  everything  to 
admire  and  to  examine.  Even  the  Sevres  vase,  a  won- 
derful object  of  beauty,  in  which  the  poor  little  Prince 
Imperial  of  Prance  was  baptized,  stands  there  a  sad 
memorial  of  his  vicissitudes. 

But  it  is  for  the  number,  rarity,  and  importance  of 
its  manuscripts  that  the  Vatican  Library  is  famous. 
Here  is  the  largest  and  most  precious  of  collections  of 
important  palimpsests.  We  saw  one  famous  manuscript, 
deciphered  by  Cardinal  Angelo  Mai,  which  contains  the 
De  Bepiiblica  of  Cicero,  the  discourse  of  St.  Augus- 
tine upon  the  Psalms,  and  fragments  of  Terence  of  the 
fourth  century ;  it  is  believed  to  be  the  most  ancient 
manuscript  in  existence.  In  the  same  room  we  were 
permitted  to  see  an  autograph  letter  of  poor  Anne 
Boleyn  to  Henry  YIIL,  the  book  of  Henry  YIII.  against 
Luther,  the  manuscript  autographs  of  Petrarch  and  Tor- 
quato  Tasso,  with  miniatures  by  Perugino,  and  so  on — 
the  richness  is  interminable.  The  present  Pope  throws 
open  the  vast  treasures  of  the  library  (under  certain  re- 


260  AN   EPISTLE   TO    POSTEEITY 

strictions)  to  scholars  of  repute  who  bring  him  accred- 
ited proofs  of  their  sincere  desire  to  use  these  privileges 
for  the  purposes  of  history. 

I  stopped  before  an  extremely  rich  case  of  illumi- 
nated manuscripts,  where  I  found  the  vignettes  of  one 
now  attributed  to  Kaphael,  and  also  of  another  ascribed 
to  Dante,  written  on  and  commented  upon  by  Boccac- 
cio ;  also  the  breviary  of  Mathias  Corvinus,  the  last  king 
of  Hungary ;  the  famous  Bible  of  the  fourth  century ; 
the  sermons  of  the  monk  Jerome,  with  miniatures ;  and 
songs  and  prayers  in  the  Japanese  characters.  Around 
me  stood  the  ages  in  this  vast  and  noble  compartment, 
this  grand  gallery  of  the  Vatican  Library.  Here  one 
may  see  the  gift  of  Francis  I.  to  Pius  YII.,  a  magnifi- 
cent writing-table  filled  with  precious  stones,  the  vase 
of  sculptured  alabaster  sent  by  Mehemet  Ali,  the  great 
lamp  of  malachite  given  by  Nicholas  of  Eussia  to  the 
Church  of  St.  Paul,  the  vases  offered  by  Charles  X.  to 
Leo  XIL,  the  marbles  of  Labrador,  the  porcelains  of 
Berlin,  the  golden  candelabra,  and  superb  rocks  of 
crystal  imbedded  in  wrought  bronze.  As  I  turned  to 
look  at  another  garde -onanuscrits  I  saw  the  Acts  of 
the  Apostles,  written  in  gold,  the  gift  of  the  Queen  of 
Cyprus  to  Innocent  YIIL ;  the  Come  £]gyptien ;  the 
Chase  of  the  Falcon,  written  by  the  Emperor  Frederick ; 
the  Life  of  the  Countess  Matilda,  with  miniatures;  and 
so  on,  until  the  mind  and  the  eye  could  take  in  no 
more.  "W"e  had  a  little  adventure  as  we  were  about 
wandering  off  into  one  of  the  galleries.  A  mass  of  mov- 
ing color  appeared  in  the  distance,  and  our  friend  the 
chamberlain,  in  affright,  remarked,  "  The  Holy  Father." 
It  was  the  Pope,  in  his  sedan-chair,  with  the  Swiss 
guard  about  him,  being  taken  to  a  private  door  whence 
he  descends  to  his  carriage.    The  sedan-chair  and  its 


THE   VATICAN  LIBRARY  261 

bearers  were  all  in  bright  crimson,  the  Swiss  guard  in 
yellow,  black,  and  red ;  so  the  whole  procession  was  a 
picture  as  we  saw  it  in  the  long  gray  vista.  We  were 
hastily  summoned  to  retire,  and  the  gaudy  pageant  was 
shut  out  from  our  view  by  the  ground-glass  doors.  We 
were  permitted,  however,  to  take  a  peep  at  the  vanish- 
ing carriage  which  conveyed  the  "  Prisoner  of  the  Vati- 
can" around  the  noble  Vatican  gardens.  These  gar- 
dens, a  park  in  themselves,  are  beautiful  indeed,  with 
their  orange  and  lemon  trees  in  full  bearing,  their  eter- 
nal green,  their  avenues  of  box,  their  lakes,  swans,  and 
artificial  fountains.  The  old  statuary  gleams  amid  the 
ilex  trees,  and  the  long  avenues,  planned  by  Palladio, 
and  afterwards  copied  at  Versailles,  need  but  the  beauty 
of  Lucre tia  Borgia  to  make  them  the  perfect  picture  of 
the  luxury  and  the  elegance  of  the  past.  They  are 
lovel}^  now,  and  sad. 

We  were  permitted,  after  seeing  the  library,  to  enter 
the  Appartement  Borgia,  a  suite  of  chambers  added  to 
the  Vatican  by  Pope  Alexander  VI.,  and  we  saw  the 
window  where  the  famous  Lucretia  sat  and  played  on 
the  mandolin.  These  rooms  are  filled  with  old  statues 
and  books,  but  are  chiefly  interesting  for  their  frescoes, 
which  are  world-renowned.  Most  of  them  are  by  Pin- 
turicchio  and  his  pupils.  These  noble  works,  the  de- 
spair of  modern  artists,  are  the  best  remnants  of  that 
richest  moment  of  Italian  art,  and,  if  we  except  the  un- 
approachable works  of  Michael  Angelo  and  Kaphael, 
are,  perhaps,  the  best  frescoes  in  the  world.  The  sub- 
jects are  Scriptural,  metaphorical,  historical,  fanciful, 
and  can  only  be  alluded  to  here ;  but  the  treatment  is 
beyond  anything  graceful,  refined,  and  beautiful.  These 
six  splendid  rooms  are  now  damp  and  dreary.  They 
do  not  enjoy  that^  priceless  Eoman  blessing,  the  morn- 


263  AN    EPISTLE  TO   POSTERITY 

ing  sun — a  strange  oversight  for  a  Borgia  to  have  made. 
They  are,  however,  the  most  interesting  rooms  in  the 
Vatican  to  the  student  of  history  and  romance,  breath- 
ing as  they  do  the  spirit  of  that  handsome,  tasteful,  and 
wicked  race  who  wreathed  their  cups  of  poison  with  the 
loveliest  flowers,  and  who  committed  their  aAvful  crimes 
with  a  grand  and  picturesque  refinement.  Indeed,  a 
human  skeleton  was  found  here  enveloped  in  a  delicate 
shroud  of  carved  alabaster — a  curious  and  emphatic  al- 
legory of  this  set  of  rococo  murderers  who  carried  good 
taste  even  into  Hades. 

From  the  Borgias  to  the  Queen  is  an  agreeable  tran- 
sition. Charming  as  she  is,  driving  through  the  grounds 
of  the  Yilla  Borghese  with  her  scarlet  liveries, ''  making 
sunshine  in  a  shady  place,"  she  is  not  free  from  insult, 
even  in  public,  from  the  "  Blacks."  Certain  princesses  of 
the  "  Black  "  (or  ultra-Catholic)  party  refuse  to  rise  when 
she  enters  the  theatre  —  even  when  all  the  audience 
stand  and  the  national  march  is  played.  At  a  repre- 
sentation of  LaJcme,  followed  by  a  ballet,  which  we 
attended  before  the  flood — that  is,  before  the  Tiber  rose 
and  closed  the  doors  of  the  Apollo  Theatre — it  hap- 
pened that  the  ballet  did  not  please  the  taste  of  the 
Italian  audience.  It  was  a  story  founded  on  one  of 
Hoffman's  fairy  tales  of  those  mechanical  toys  who  sud- 
denly become  human,  and  of  a  dancing-girl  who  in  turn 
becomes  a  mechanical  doll.  A  very  admirable  dancer 
named  Giura  was  interpreting  this  somewhat  tedious 
process  as  well  as  she  could ;  but  the  Eoman  audience, 
as  cruel  now  as  in  the  days  of  the  gladiators,  hissed, 
whistled,  stamped,  piped,  and  halloed  in  a  most  insulting 
manner.  It  was  considered  also  a  great  affront  to  the 
Queen  thus  to  ignore  her  presence,  which  should  have 
protected  the  actress  from  insult. 


DRIVE  AROUND  KOME  363 

We  were  fortunate  to  have  driven  out  to  San  Paolo 
fuori  le  Mura  before  the  Tiber  rose.  It  is  now  all 
under  water.  It  is  a  most  desolate  site  on  the  Cam- 
pagna,  and  is  considered  unhealthy.  Yet  it  is  where 
St.  Paul  was  buried,  and  the  original  basilica,  burned 
in  1823,  was  famous  for  its  beauty.  The  present  edifice, 
which  has  cost  $40,000,000,  is  uninteresting  in  spite  of 
its  magnificence.  We  drove  thence  to  the  Tre  Fontani, 
where  the  springs  of  fresh  water  attest  to  the  miracu- 
lous three  leaps  of  St.  PauFs  head  after  it  was  cut  off. 
Here  are  some  wonderful  old  frescoes  found  at  Ostia, 
and  a  fine  Domenichino.  The  neighboring  fields  are 
planted  with  the  eucalyptus  tree,  whose  growth  has 
so  much  improved  the  health  of  the  Campagna.  The 
monks  distil  an  admirable  cordial  from  the  eucalyptus 
which  is  said  to  be  a  sovereign  preventive  of  malaria, 
and  we  purchased  a  bottle,  besides  taking  a  glass  of  it. 
It  has  a  bitter  taste,  like  quinine,  and  is  not  at  all  un- 
pleasant. It  defends  the  weakness  of  the  man,  while 
the  eucalyptus  sucks  the  poison  from  the  wounded  earth. 
Yesterday,  while  driving  down  the  Yia  JS'azionale  (the 
new  street  decreed  by  the  tasteless  municipal  govern- 
ment, to  which  I  have  already  alluded,  and  which  has 
destroyed  many  noble  monuments,  both  of  the  Eenais- 
sance  and  also  of  an  earlier  period),  we  were  met  by  the 
tramontana,  the  cold  successor  of  the  sirocco.  Anything 
more  like  a  Boston  east  wind  no  one  ever  felt,  and  as 
we  reached  a  commanding  point  of  view  in  our  drive  we 
saw  much  snow  on  the  distant  mountains.  We  have 
not  enjoyed  the  sight  of  a  French  or  English  (much  less 
an  American)  newspaper  for  three  days,  and  hear  that 
both  ends  of  the  Mont  Cenis  Tunnel  are  blocked  with 
snow.  It  is  cold  in  Eome,  but  still  ladies  pick  handfuls 
of  violets  and  anemones  in  the  grounds  of  the  Pamphili 


264  AN  EPISTLE   TO  POSTERITY 

Doria,  and  drive,  well  wrapped,  all  the  sunlighted  hours 
of  the  day.  In  these  strains  did  I  write  home  to  my 
friends,  who  were  enjoying  a  beautifully  mild  winter  in 
America.  In  all  my  European  journeys  I  have  had 
fine  weather.  This  especial  winter  in  Eome,  1884-5, 
was,  after  this  little  episode,  a  well-remembered  example 
of  fine  weather ;  and  even  in  England,  land  of  fogs  and 
rain,  I  have  enjoyed  five  seasons  of  almost  uninterrupted 
sunshine,  having  never  seen  but  one  London  fog. 


CHAPTER  XV 

The  Queen's  Jubilee — London  in  Gala  Dress — The  Queen's  Garden 
Party — A  Dash  into  Holland  and  the  Low  Countries — Dikes  and 
Ditches  —  Picture-galleries  and  Windmills — Rotterdam  and  Am- 
sterdam—  The  Zuyder  Zee  and  a  Day  at  Marken  —  Forgotten 
Bruges  and  Prosperous  Ghent — Antwerp  and  The  Hague — Ostend 
the  Frivolous. 

To  go  to  Westminster  Abbey  to  see  a  Queen  celebrate 
her  fiftieth  anniversary  as  a  sovereign  was  enough  to 
make  the  London  season  of  1887  a  memorable  one  to  me. 

The  Abbey,  like  all  ecclesiastical  structures  of  that 
kind  (for  it  was  once  the  Palace  of  Westminster),  has  a 
certain  double  sentiment  pervading  and  controlling  all 
its  arrangements.  Its  sacerdotal  and  its  royal  character 
are  inseparable.  One  thinks  of  the  great  stream  of  coro- 
nations which  have  flowed  on  unchecked  from  1050  to 
1887.  It  is  filled  with  a  great  army  of  dead  kings. 
Royal  fingers  touch  it  everywhere,  from  the  simple 
altar  which  the  Confessor  reared  to  his  God  to  the 
florid  chapel  which  Henry  YII.  built  in  his  enthusiasm 
for  himself.  Queen  Matilda,  Edward  III.,  Eichard  II., 
Elizabeth,  Henry  Y.,  Mary  (Bloody  Mary),  poor,  beau- 
tiful Mary  of  Scotland,  James  I.,  Charles  II.,  prosaic 
Anne,  George  II. — they  each  revive  a  memorable  age, 
and  their  united  requiem  swells  the  music  which  dies 
away  under  yonder  groined  roof. 

It  is  a  great  place  to  see  every  day.  What  was  it  not 
on  the  Jubilee  day! 


266  AN   EPISTLE   TO    POSTEEITY 

Eight  millions  of  people  walked  London  streets  on 
that  great  day.  I  saw  the  procession  from  the  Hotel 
Metropole,  near  to  the  spot  where  Charles  I.  lost  his 
head,  opposite  Charing  Cross  Station,  with  a  distant 
view  of  Christopher  Wren's  seven  churches,  the  Obe- 
lisk (silent  reminder  of  the  mutability  of  kings),  the 
Thames  Embankment,  and  the  Houses  of  Parliament. 
What  a  splendid  view ! 

First  the  crowd,  black,  endless,  a  surging  sea,  and  the 
soldiers  forming  a  living  wall  to  assist  the  police  to 
keep  back  the  crowd.  Many  a  fainting  woman  was 
taken  out  of  the  press  and  borne  across  to  the  open 
space.  Then  the  music,  the  march  of  endless  soldiers 
and  sailors,  the  gay  uniforms,  the  splendid  equipages. 

And  after  that  the  royal  princesses  and  the  royal 
children ;  the  Indian  princes,  reckless  in  jewels,  turbans, 
and  splendid  robes ;  the  procession  of  princes,  the  Queen's 
sons ;  and  a  glorious  figure  all  in  white,  on  a  black  horse 
— something  out  of  Albrecht  Diirer — the  Crown  Prince 
of  Prussia,  afterwards  the  Emperor  Frederick.  This  was 
the  prettiest,  the  most  gallant  sight  of  all.  Then  came 
the  Queen  in  an  open  carriage  drawn  by  six  cream 
horses,  whose  manes  and  tails  were  particularly  opulent. 
A  sneerer  said  that  they  were  false.  These  ponies  are 
all  of  a  breed  which  is  raised  in  Hanover  for  the  Queen's 
own  use. 

Opposite  the  Queen  sat  the  Princess  of  Wales  and  the 
Empress  Frederick,  and  by  her  side  was  a  huge  bouquet 
with  the  letter  A  in  red  flowers  on  a  white  background, 
a  tribute  to  the  late  Prince  Consort.  She  is  not  a  beauty, 
this  gracious  Queen,  but  on  that  day  she  looked  her 
royal  part.  She  was  dressed  in  white  and  black  lace, 
with  some  diamonds  in  her  bonnet,  which  looked  not 
unlike  a  crown.     She  bowed  to  right  and  left  with  a 


LONDON   IN   GALA  DRESS  267 

swaying  motion,  which,  I  heard  later  on,  made  her  very 
ill.  There  Avas  an  absurd  rumor  that  dynamite  bombs 
might  be  thrown  at  her  from  the  roofs  by  anarchists, 
but  she  got  through  the  day  without  an  accident ;  and 
in  all  those  eight  millions  of  sight-seers  only  one  man 
was  killed,  and  he  by  the  kick  of  a  horse. 

In  the  evening  the  illuminations  were  splendid.  Ever}^- 
thing  but  St.  Paul's  was  lighted  up,  and  that  showed  its 
great  black  mass  to  perfection  against  the  glare  of  elec- 
trical light.  It  was  like  the  street  of  a  thousand  flowers 
in  Vatheh,  something  supernatural. 

The  reception  which  her  Majesty  gave  to  thirty  thou- 
sand school-children  in  Hyde  Park  was  the  next  glorious 
day  for  the  public.  These  dear  little,  laughing,  healthy 
English  children,  the  visitors  of  the  Future  coming  to 
greet  the  Past,  were  most  affecting.  Their  songs,  their 
cheers,  made  the  tears  rain  down  the  face  of  the  Queen. 
They  were  royally  treated  to  the  games,  cakes,  and  toys 
peculiarly  fitted  to  their  youth,  and  the  arrangements 
were  made  with  such  excellent  foresight  that  even  a 
hospital  tent  was  provided  where  nurses  and  doctors 
stood  ready  with  Jamaica  ginger  and  camphor  for  the 
little  jubilant  who  had  found  cakes,  pies,  and  oranges 
one  too  many  for  him. 

The  whole  scene  as  the  Queen,  in  her  barouche,  dressed 
in  a  purple  velvet  robe  and  white  bonnet,  swept  under 
that  gorgeous  message  of  welcome,  "  Welcome,  Queen- 
mother  and  friend !" — embroidered  on  a  golden  flag,  and 
stretched  across  from  two  Venetian  poles — was  most  sin- 
gularly impressive  and  grand. 

When  that  "good  chap"  the  Prince  of  Wales  de- 
scended from  his  carriage,  and  taking  a  little  girl,  w^hose 
name  was  Florence  Dunn,  presented  her  to  the  Queen, 
to  receive  the  Jubilee  cup,  for  "  excellent  scholarship," 


268  AN   EPISTLE   TO    POSTEEITY 

the  shouting  was  tremendous.  One  feared  that  so  much 
applause  would  make  Florence  Dunn  a  little  prig  for- 
ever, but  she  looked  very  modest  and  pretty. 

London  was  very  handsome  in  its  red  trimmings. 
Every  shade  of  red,  from  ruby  to  magenta,  from  scarlet 
to  crimson,  was  used  in  the  decorations.  If  this  joyous 
pigment  is  sunshine  incarnate,  as  some  painters  say,  it 
was  what  the  old  gray  city  always  needs,  and  these 
Jubilee  decorations  were  most  becoming.  From  that 
great  edifice  and  memorial  of  English  history,  the  Tower 
of  London,  to  Westminster  Abbey,  to  Buckingham  Pal- 
ace, even  to  the  Temple  Church,  still  in  its  original  beau- 
ty, down  the  busy  Strand,  and  through  Eegent  Street, 
the  leagues  of  historical  buildings  along  the  Thames,  the 
various  palaces  and  towers,  the  houses  of  the  great  peo- 
ple— all  London  was  beauty.  The  mighty  ports  and  docks 
and  bridges  of  that  great  river,  as  profoundly  historic  as 
those  of  the  Khine  or  the  Tiber,  fluttered  with  the  royal 
colors.     Flags  flew  from  every  coign  of  vantage. 

In  the  parks,  summer  kept  up  the  scheme  of  decora- 
tion with  roses  and  azaleas  and  rhododendrons.  It  was 
a  worthy  sight  from  Charing  Cross  to  South  Kensington. 

I  was  amazed  to  be  invited  out  much  on  Sunday.  A 
very  great  change  has  come  over  England  in  this  re- 
spect since  I  saw  it  first.  Even  Thackeray  was  criti- 
cised for  "allowing  a  man  to  have  harmless  pleasure 
when  he  had  done  his  worship  on  Sunday,"  showing 
what  the  Sunday  of  his  time  was.  The  fashionable 
classes  in  London  in  the  years  1884-88  gave  breakfasts 
and  lawn -tennis  parties  of  a  Sunday  afternoon,  and 
drives  to  the  country  were  fashionable ;  there  were  also 
very  many  dinners  in  town,  Sunday  parades  in  Hyde 
Park,coach  drives  of  clubs :  the  drags  assembled  at  Hamp- 
ton Court,  Kichmond,  etc.    I  heard  that  there  were  con- 


A  queen's  garden  party 


certs  and  theatrical  performances ;  I  never  went  to  any 
of  them,  so  I  cannot  say,  but  I  quote  a  writer  of  the 
day :  "  In  the  days  of  George  III.  and  Queen  Charlotte, 
when  every  one  went  to  church  to  be  bullied  and  thumped 
into  heaven  by  threats  and  fears,  Sunday  parties  were 
much  more  in  vogue,  not  only  in  private  houses,  but  in 
public  rooms.  Now  that  we  are  not  driven  into  heaven, 
but  allowed  to  find  it  our  own  way,  our  merriment  of 
Sunday  is  less  outrageous." 

But  all  this  is  "  society's  "  Sunday.  The  majority  of 
Londoners  of  the  middle  class  still  keep  to  their  chapels, 
churches,  gardens,  and  homes ;  it  is  a  beautifully  quiet 
and  respectable  day  in  the  London  suburbs.  It  is  true 
that  people  seek  the  fresh  air,  couples  go  out  on  their 
bicycles,  immense  numbers  of  pedestrians  are  turning 
out  towards  the  parks,  and  there  is  a  great  deal  of  move- 
ment, but  it  is  decorous  and  becoming.  It  is  one  of 
the  distinctions  of  New  York  that  it  is  also  a  Sunday- 
keeping  city.  We  of  the  small  contingent  of  the  Anglo- 
Saxon  race  are  the  only  people  who  observe  the  Lord's 
day  in  this  fashion.  , 

I  had  been  to  a  state  concert  and  to  a  state  ball,  and 
I  supposed  my  chances  of  seeing  Buckingham  Palace 
again  were  very  small,  when  I  received  an  unexpected 
invitation  to  the  garden  party  in  the  park  behind 
Buckingham  Palace,  opened  by  the  Queen  for  the  first 
time  in  eighteen  years.  Curiously  enough,  I  had  been 
in  London  on  that  first  occasion,  and  had  looked  through 
my  opera-glass  from  the  windows  of  Buckingham  Pal- 
ace Hotel  down  into  its  gay  crowds ;  but  then  I  had  not 
been  presented,  so  was  not  eligible  to  an  invitation. 

It  was  a  beautiful  scene,  and  I  think  the  glance  down 
that  stately  staircase,  at  the  foot  of  which  stood  a 
group  of  the  Indiali  princes  who  had  come  over  for  the 


270  AN   EPISTLE    TO   POSTEEITY 

Jubilee,  was  one  of  the  handsomest  things  I  had  ever 
seen. 

Why  should  it  not  be.  And  then  the  back  of  the 
palace  (never  seen  by  Londoners  except  on  such  an  oc- 
casion) is  so  beautiful ;  the  magnificent  trees,  the  velvet 
turf,  the  ornamental  little  lakes — each  with  a  boatful  of 
well-dressed  people  sailing  up  and  down — the  whole 
lawn  dotted  with  fashionably  attired  people,  and  every- 
where scarlet  coats  and  uniforms  and  orders ! 

Presently  a  gentleman  said  to  me,  "  Come  this  way." 
I  did  so,  and  found  we  were  making  a  live  alleyway  for 
the  Queen  to  walk  down.  She  arrived  at  one  of  the 
great  gates  in  royal  state — four  horses  to  her  carriage, 
the  Scotch  servants  behind,  and  a  group  of  outriders — 
and  was  received  by  all  her  children,  who  walked  with 
her  through  this  living  lane.  They  were  all  chatting 
and  laughing,  and  bowing  right  and  left  as  they  fol- 
lowed the  royal  pipers,  who  always  precede  the  Queen. 

She  stopped,  as  she  came  near  me,  to  speak  to  and 
kiss  the  Maharajah  Kueh  Behar,  who  is  a  pretty  little 
Indian  princess,  as  brown  as  a  berry,  dressed  in  her  na- 
tive costume.  She  and  her  husband  are  very  indepen- 
dent, advanced  Indians  who  have  been  educated  in 
England. 

I  noticed,  as  she  spoke  to  this  little  lad}'-,  how  very 
pretty  is  the  Queen's  smile.  She  has  little  teeth,  not 
set  close  together,  but  very  white,  and  this  smile  makes 
her  face  almost  handsome. 

The  prince  walked  with  her,  his  handsome  wife  hav- 
ing preceded  him.  The  royalties,  having  promenaded 
around  the  ground,  then  separated  and  helped  to  enter- 
tain the  company.  We  were  asked  to  enter  the  tents, 
under  which  refreshments  were  offered,  and  I  remember 
that  somebody  who  seemed  to  be  host  or  hostess  came 


THE   QUEEN   LAYS   A   CORNER-STONE  271 

and  talked  to  me  when  I  had  temporarily  lost  my 
party.  I  think  there  must  have  been  five  thousand 
people  present. 

Standing  by  a  window,  but  not  allowed  to  speak,  was 
the  Crown  Prince  Frederick,  already  entering  upon  those 
weary  days  of  agony  that  were  to  end  his  noble  life. 

This  party  caused  much  jealousy  among  the  Ameri- 
cans, as  Mr.  Phelps  had  the  right  to  but  few  entrances, 
and  five  hundred  wanted  to  see  it ;  and  naturally'-,  for  it 
was  the  climax  of  the  Jubilee  entertainments. 

Here  come  in  the  hardships  of  a  minister's  life.  JSTow 
that  we  send  ambassadors,  I  hope  that  they  either  will 
have  more  cards  for  these  court  festivities  or  that  they 
will  not  be  so  accessible.  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Phelps  were 
immensely  popular,  full  of  tact,  and  as  kind  as  they 
could  be,  but  they  were  very  discriminating  and  per- 
fectly firm ;  indeed,  they  could  not  yield.  But  imagine 
a  man  with  only  forty  invitations  to  give  out  and  all 
the  United  States  desiring  them ! 

The  last  that  I  shall  describe  of  the  public  festivities 
was  a  drive  to  Windsor  Castle  and  in  the  Park,  to  see 
the  Queen  lay  the  corner-stone  of  the  statue  to  Prince 
Albert — the  Woman's  Jubilee  offering  to  her  Majesty. 

My  friend  the  Hon.  Mrs  Wellesley  invited  me  down 
to  her  cottage  at  Hough,  near  Windsor,  to  pass  a  day 
or  two,  and  we  drove  to  the  castle,  where  Mrs.  Welles- 
ley  had  lived  twenty-seven  years  as  one  of  the  Queen's 
household,  the  wife  of  Dean  Wellesley,  the  Queen's 
confidential  friend.  I  saw  that  inner  quadrangle  and 
the  houses  of  the  present  dean,  also  the  chapel  erected 
to  the  Prince  Consort,  and  the  beautiful  cenotaph  of  the 
Prince  Imperial  of  France,  that  poor  boy  who  fell  in 
Zululand.  He  lies  in  the  chapel  of  the  Edsalls,  and  is 
sculptured  as  he  fell,  in  the  undress  uniform  of  his  corps. 


372  AN   EPISTLE    TO   POSTERITY 

It  is  a  touching  statue,  and  his  last  letter  to  the  Queen 
is  carved  on  the  base. 

Windsor  Castle,  which  covers  fifty  acres  of  ground, 
is  the  most  superb  and  interesting  royal  house  in  the 
world  to  me ;  and  to  see  it  thus  intimately,  and  to  catch 
a  glimpse  of  that  life  which  surrounds  the  sovereign, 
was  most  interesting  and  unusual.  It  is  a  village  in 
stone,  and  I  believe  contains,  with  all  its  appanage,  four 
thousand  people.  After  taking  tea  with  the  wife  of  the 
present  dean  we  drove  to  South  Park  to  see  the  corner- 
stone laid  for  the  statue  to  the  Prince  Consort.  We 
found  many  people  there,  and  saw  Mrs.  Gladstone 
courtesy ing  to  Prince  Christian,  and  all  the  ladies  of 
the  committee  standing  around  the  beginning  of  the 
work ;  also  an  old  woman  who  had  walked  from  Scot- 
land to  see  the  Jubilee.  Then  came  the  royal  cor- 
tege. The  Queen,  with  four  horses  and  postilions,  es- 
corted by  the  Guards,  entered  with  a  sweep;  and  a 
dozen  or  so  ladies  and  gentlemen  following  in  carriages 
and  on  horseback  made  a  pretty  sight.  The  princes  and 
the  Crown  Prince  of  Germany,  Marquis,  of  Lome,  and 
Prince  Henry  of  Battenberg  all  wore  the  Windsor  liv- 
ery, which  I  thought  not  pretty. 

The  Queen  alighted  from  her  carriage  and,  followed 
by  her  daughters,  walked  about  to  speak  to  people.  She 
shook  hands  with  the  Baroness  Burdett  -  Coutts  and 
with  many  others.  She  greeted  many  people  cordially, 
then  crossed  over  to  the  old  woman  who  had  walked 
from  Scotland  and  greeted  her  so  cordially  that  the  old 
woman  began  to  talk.  Then  she  (the  Queen)  curled  her 
royal  lip  and  walked  on. 

The  ceremony  of  laying  the  corner-stone  was  very 
short,  and  then  the  Dean  of  Westminster  asked  the 
school-children  present  (some  six  hundred)  to  sing  "  Old 


A   DASH   INTO   HOLLAND   AND   THE   LOW  COUNTKIES      273 

Hundred  "  and  "  God  save  the  Queen."  He  said  there 
was  nothing  so  dear  to  the  Queen  as  the  voices  of  her 
subjects. 

Half  of  them  sang  Old  Hundred  and  the  other  half 
"  God  save  the  Queen,"  and  the  effect  was  not  musical. 
I  fear  the  Queen  did  not  on  that  occasion  like  the  voices 
of  her  subjects. 

It  was  on  my  return  from  the  Queen's  garden  party, 
I  think,  that  I  received  a  delightful  and  unexpected  in- 
vitation to  accompany  some  friends  to  Holland. 

There  are  some  days  which  are  the  seed-pods  of  des- 
tiny. We  look  back  on  them  as  landmarks.  I  regard 
this  day  as  one  of  my  best  seed-pods.  I  fell  in  with 
friends  who  were  the  perfection  of  kindness  and  devo- 
tion. They  loved  art,  and  were  indeed  the  most  satisfac- 
tory of  connoisseurs.  Together  we  spent  three  delightful 
weeks  in  Belgium  and  Holland,  a  journey  which,  made 
as  we  made  it — from  Dover  to  Calais  on  one  of  the 
splendid  new  steamers,  and  thence  to  Brussels — is  as 
easy  as  going  from  New  York  to  Newport,  and  one 
from  which  the  most  delicate  invalid  need  not  shrink. 
The  only  hot  and  dusty  ride  we  had  in  a  summer  un- 
precedented for  heat  and  drought  was  on  the  14th  of 
August,  from  Brussels  to  Paris.  But  that  was  only  the 
end  of  a  charming  trip.  Let  me  advise  every  one  to 
take  this  trip  who  has  not  already  enjoyed  the  Low 
Countries.  At  Brussels  one  sees  the  Flemish  school  in 
all  its  native  beauty  and  charm :  Yan  Eyck  and  Bueghel, 
Yan  der  Weiden,  Philip  de  Champagne,  Bacheerele  and 
De  Heem,  all  engaged  our  attention.  In  the  Musee 
Moderne  is  a  fine  collection  of  modern  Belgian  art.  An 
exquisite  old  bit  is  Notre  Dame  de  Chapelle,  founded  in 
1134,  with  a  most  elegant  choir  and  nave,  and  of  course 
the  glorious  town-haU.    And  how  exquisite  the  drives 


274  AN   EPISTLE   TO   POSTEEITY 

through  the  Bois  de  la  Cambre  leading  to  the  Forest  of 
Soignies,  whence  one  pierces  the  dark  recesses  of  the 
forest,  or  winds  down  in  grassy  slopes  to  glades  in  the 
miniature  valleys  below,  and  surprises  the  wood-nymphs 
at  the  fountain. 

The  only  trouble  about  Brussels  was  that  we  were 
thinking  of  Antwerp  and  Amsterdam  and  Ghent  and 
Bruges,  and  we  hardly  gave  the  beautiful  Belgian  Paris 
as  much  attention  as  it  deserved.  However,  we  kept 
coming  back  to  it,  and  found  it  always  delightful;  a 
comfortable,  pretty,  and  healthy  city  of  four  hundred 
thousand  inhabitants — under  Leopold,  most  cultivated  of 
kings — and  certainly  not  a  bad  place  to  live  in. 

However,  our  dash  into  Holland,  after  the  furor  and 
fever  heat  of  the  Jubilee,  was  like  taking  a  swim  at  Long 
Beach  after  the  heat  of  a  day  in  New  York.  It  looked 
so  green  and  so  cool,  and  was  so  still  and  calm.  Some 
wit  said  that  after  this  life  was  ended  he  hoped  he 
should  come  into  existence  again  as  a  cow,  for  he 
thought  cows  were  always  taken  care  of  and  always 
in  pleasant  places.  Certainly  if  I  must  be  a  cow  when 
I  appear  again  on  this  earth,  after  the  Pythagorean 
theory,  I  hope  I  shall  be  a  Holland  cow,  for  of  all  ani- 
mals it  is  the  most  to  be  envied.  Holland  is  a  land 
of  intense  paradox.  It  is  quite  impossible,  but  it  is 
there.  It  is  a  house  built  in  the  sand,  which  stands  for 
ages ;  it  is  tied  together  with  wisps  of  straw,  for,  as  every- 
body knows,  artificial  dikes  of  earth  and  reeds  protect 
the  spots  where  the  sea  is  higher  than  the  land.  In  no 
other  country  do  the  keels  of  the  ships  float  above  the 
chimneys,  and  nowhere  else  does  the  frog  croaking  from 
among  the  bulrushes  look  down  upon  the  swallow  on 
the  house-tops.  Where  rivers  take  their  course  it  is 
not  through  beds  of  their  own  choosing ;  they  are  com- 


THE   WINDMILLS   OF   HOLLAND  275 

pelled  to  pass  through  canals,  and  are  confined  within 
fixed  bounds  b}^  the  stupendous  mounds  built  by  man. 
Here  and  nowhere  else  does  the  impetuous  ocean  obey 
the  imperious  command,  "  Thus  far  shalt  thou  go,  and 
no  farther." 

The  first  thing  we  noticed  were  the  windmills,  most 
picturesque  of  objects.  They  seem  to  fill  in  one's  long- 
ing for  mountains,  for  something  to  look  up  to.  These 
stolid  Dutchmen  have  made  the  wind  their  slave,  and 
not  a  breath  of  air  passes  over  Holland  without  paying 
toll.  These  beautiful  but  peaceful  giants,  with  whom 
Don  Quixote  fought,  stand  in  crowds  about  the  great 
cities,  swinging  their  great  impersonal  arms,  as  if  bid- 
ding defiance  to  the  enemy.  They  weigh  the  cheeses, 
saw  the  timber,  and  drain  the  land.  The  wind  coun- 
teracts the  water,  as  both  fought  for  the  defence  of 
Leyden.  There  are  nine  thousand  windmills  in  Holland, 
and  their  annual  service  to  the  people  is  valued  at  eight 
millions  of  dollars. 

These  airy  ministers  redeem  the  landscape  from  in- 
sipidity, for  it  is  to  be  feared  the  Dutchman  loves 
straight  lines,  and  there  is  a  formal  and  methodical  di- 
rectness to  his  taste.  "Water,  however,  is  a  freakish  imp, 
and  cannot  be  commonplace ;  with  its  lights  and  shad- 
ows, its  perpetual  ripple,  even  a  canal  is  beautiful.  As 
we  approached  the  larger  bodies  of  water,  like  the  Zuy- 
der  Zee,  we  were  brimful  of  admiration  for  the  opaline 
tints  of  sea  and  sky.  It  must  be  this  which  has  made 
the  Dutch  such  colorists,  for  their  great  painters  rarely 
left  Holland  for  their  subjects. 

I  shall  never  forget  the  entrancing  view  of  Rotter- 
dam as  we  looked  down  on  it  from  a  railroad  bridge. 
It  seemed  as  if  it  were  a  bit  of  stage  scenery.  Hood 
calls  it 


276  AN   EPISTLE   TO  POSTERITY 

"A  sort  of  vulgar  Venice, 
Improve  it  if  you  can." 

To  me  it  was  almost  as  beautiful  as  Yenice,  for  the 
architecture,  the  canals,  the  trees,  the  vast  crowd  of 
masts,  made  it  a  poem.  Had  I  not  seen  Amsterdam 
later  on,  I  should  have  alwa3^s  thought  Eotterdam 
peerless.  We  afterwards  spent  a  day  there,  and  were 
somewhat  disillusioned,  but  we  were  delighted  with  the 
first  picture.  I  cannot  get  over  it.  I  must  repeat  my- 
self :  Eotterdam  is  beautiful. 

But  Amsterdam,  with  the  river  Amstel  helping  to 
give  a  lively  current  to  its  canals,  with  its  patchwork 
of  water  streets,  its  long  double  rows  of  trees  which 
seem  endless,  its  palaces,  its  magnificent  houses  with 
machicolated  roofs,  and,  above  all,  the  quaint  craft,  the 
old  Dutch  galleons,  with  their  shadowy  sails,  their  fine 
brown  color,  their  queer  round  outlines,  their  unending 
picturesqueness,  is  a  paradise  for  the  painter.  It  is  one 
of  the  most  beautiful  cities  in  the  world,  and  I  do  not 
wonder  that  the  artists  have  gone  mad  over  it.  Imag- 
ine having  in  front  of  your  door  a  row  of  trees,  then  a 
broad  beautiful  river,  then  on  the  other  side  another 
row  of  tall  elms,  and  on  the  bosom  of  the  river  the  most 
quaint  and  most  impressive  of  Dutch  galleons,  of  that 
dark-brown  color  like  old  mahogany,  for  which  Dutch 
ships  and  Dutch  sails  seem  to  have  taken  out  a  patent. 
Yes,  a  dozen  of  them,  with  families  living  on  the  ship. 
Even  the  family  washing,  which  the  boatman's  wife 
hangs  out,  with  an  occasional  red  shirt,  helps  the  picture. 
It  is  a  dream  of  color  and  tender  tones. 

We  spent  several  days  at  Amsterdam  in  order  to  see 
the  unrivalled  galleries,  and  to  go  to  the  Island  of 
Marken,  which  is  the  very  heart  of  Holland.    We  char. 


THE   ZTJYDEK    ZEE  AND   A   DAY   AT   MAEKEN  277 

tered  a  little  steam-tug,  put  a  luncheon  on  board,  and 
steamed  out  into  the  Zuyder  Zee.  I  can  scarcely  tell 
you  how  lovely  the  day  was,  and  what  a  vision  of  the 
Flying  Dutchman  we  had  in  the  shadowy  sails  made 
on  the  herring  craft,  by  their  custom  of  hanging  the 
nets  up  to  the  masts  to  dry.  This  was  indeed  a  gobe- 
lin tapestry.  When  we  arrived,  after  two  hours,  at 
Marken  we  found  their  herring  fleet  at  anchor,  each 
with  a  little  pennant  at  the  mast-head,  delightfully 
pretty. 

The  Island  of  Marken  is  one  of  the  great  curiosities 
of  Holland.  Its  fisherfolk  have  a  picturesque  costume 
which  they  have  never  changed.  Probably  a  Marken 
man  looks  as  he  did  when  Charles  Y.  visited  the  island. 
The  women  wear  a  cap  with  strange  gold  jewelr}^  and 
a  blue  petticoat,  full  plaited,  with  a  bright  jacket,  full 
sleeves,  and  a  kerchief  neatly  pinned.  Even  the  little 
children  wear  this  costume.  The  men  wear  knicker- 
bockers, and  have  the  loose  shirt-collar  fastened  with 
most  ornate  buttons.  We  tried  to  buy  a  pair  of  these 
buttons,  which  are  of  solid  gold  and  fine  Avorkmanship, 
but  they  would  not  sell  them.  They  were  making  their 
hay  as  we  visited  them,  and  it  was  a  pretty  sight  to 
see  girls  pushing  the  flat  boats  around  with  poles,  from 
the  sand-dunes  and  islets,  which  composed  the  group 
called  Marken,  to  the  one  central  point  where  the  hay 
was  piled.  They  have  no  fresh  water  on  this  island, 
but  bring  it  daily  from  Amsterdam,  as  they  do  their 
bread.  We  saw  them  unlading  the  two  necessaries  of 
life  from  the  Amsterdam  boat  and  carrying  them  off  in 
boats  to  their  cottages.  A  life  so  amphibious  would 
seem  monotonous  to  us,  but  they  love  it  as  the  Swiss 
does  his  mountains.  No  Marken  man  or  maid  will 
marry  out  of  the  town.     The  race  is  an  aristocratic  one. 


278  AN   EPISTLE    TO   POSTERITY 

The  islanders  are  as  healthy  as  possible,  and  one  school- 
master and  one  church  supply  them  with  two  of  the 
great  necessities  of  this  and  the  next  world. 

But  Marken  is  sufficient  unto  itself.  One  young  boy 
of  nineteen,  the  only  person  on  the  island  who  could 
speak  English,  acted  as  our  guide.  He  said  he  had  been 
to  California.  This  seemed  to  bring  him  near  to  us,  and 
we  found  that  the  young  Dutch  sailor  had  clearly  appre- 
hended America  as  the  golden  land  where  fortunes 
were  to  be  made ;  but  his  father  had  been  drowned,  and 
he  was  obliged  to  come  back  to  take  care  of  his  wid- 
owed mother.  From  him  we  got  many  details  of  this 
strange  sequestered  spot,  this  queer  human  existence 
where  one  is  satisfied  with  what  one  has,  which  is 
surely  unique  in  our  feverish  nineteenth  century.  Our 
sail  home  through  the  delicious,  invigorating  salt  sea 
air,  our  gliding  into  the  canal,  our  excellent  lunch  on 
board,  were  highly  appreciated.  The  vision  of  true 
Dutch  life  on  the  shores  of  the  canal,  the  little  visit  to 
Broek,  where  the  people  are  so  offensively  clean,  made 
this  a  day  to  be  marked  with  a  white  stone. 

As  for  Dutch  cleanliness,  I  must  say  it  stops  short  of 
the  person  and  the  olfactories.  Dutch  bedrooms  are 
not  as  we  should  say  "aired";  "stuffy"  is  the  word 
which  I  should  use.  The  Marken  peasants  sleep  in  a 
sort  of  bunk,  as  they  would  on  board  ship.  Indeed, 
their  maritime  habits  have  made  them  careless  of  what 
we  consider  a  necessity  of  life,  a  good  bed.  In  fact,  I 
may  say  that  I  think  the  Americans  are  the  only  peo- 
ple who  have  good  beds.  I  consider  the  American 
bedroom  unparalleled  for  freshness,  comfort,  and  clean- 
liness. It  is  worth  going  all  over  Europe  in  order  to 
come  home  to  one's  own  bed. 

It  was  impossible  not  to  be  thrilled  as  we  darted 


AMERICAN   APPRECIATION   OF   THE  DUTCH  279 

over  these  placid  waters  with  the  recollection  of  the 
magnificent  display  of  courage  which  their  very  vol- 
ume has  inspired.  The  arms  of  Zealand  are  a  lion 
swimming,  with  the  motto  "  I  strive  and  keep  my  head 
above  water."  Imagine  living  in  a  country  where,  on 
the  safe  side  of  a  dike,  one  hears  the  waves  roaring 
ten  or  twelve  feet  above  one's  head.  Etna  or  Vesuvius, 
the  earthquake  or  the  avalanche,  is  a  safer  neighbor. 
All  Holland  is  hourly  threatened  with  submersion. 
Watchmen  are  posted  day  and  night  to  watch  the  line 
of  threatened  attack.  The  rise  and  fall  of  the  tide 
are  measured  with  perpetual  anxiety.  Chicago  with 
the  anarchists  abroad  was  not  more  filled  with  danger 
than  is  Holland  all  the  time.  If  the  dike  is  suspected 
and  a  breach  be  apprehended  a  bulwark  is  built  of 
rushes  and  earth  with  incredible  rapidity.  The  whole 
of  the  Zuyder  Zee  was  dry  land  in  the  thirteenth  cen- 
tury. It  is  now  water  which  has  been  pushed  out  to 
make  room  for  land. 

How  proud  we  Americans  should  be  of  the  admira- 
ble books  Americans  have  written  of  the  Dutch !  Bet- 
ter than  all  comes  up  the  memory  of  Motley's  Bise  of 
the  Dutch  Republic  and  the  History  of  the  United 
Netherlands,  We  see  again  old  Van  Tromp,  with  his 
broom  at  the  mast-head;  we  see  Admiral  de  Kuyter, 
brave  old  sailor,  keeping  the  French  at  bay  until  his  in- 
domitable Dutchmen  on  shore  have  opened  the  sluice- 
ways and  flooded  the  polders.  Anything  but  foreign 
tyranny !    The  Dutch  cannot  stand  that. 

The  high  cultivation  of  the  fields  and  gardens,  the 
beauty  of  the  flowers  and  trees,  the  greenness  of  the 
grass,  the  compensation  for  flatness  in  the  perfection  of 
finish,  struck  us  forcibly  as  we  looked  at  the  country 
about  Amsterdam: 


280  .  AN   EPISTLE   TO   POSTERITY 

As  for  the  old  city  itself,  with  its  houses  leaning  for- 
ward at  an  angle  which  sometimes  looked  dangerous, 
with  their  old  fa9ades,  carved  in  1560,  perhaps ;  with 
the  iron  crane  and  chain  starting  forward  from  the 
roof — how  we  wished  E'ew  Amsterdam  had  preserved 
some  of  these  quaint  houses !  Their  insecurity  of  foun- 
dation does  not  seem  to  impair  their  solidity  and  safety. 
"Within  them  what  choice  pictures  we  saw,  what  gleams 
of  comfort  and  of  a  sober  luxury  ! 

The  great  gallery  of  pictures  at  Amsterdam  is  one 
of  the  sights  of  Europe,  and  is,  I  think,  better  arranged 
than  almost  any  other  gallery.  Nothing  can  be  more 
tiresome  than  to  hear  one  describe  pictures,  but  it  is 
certainly  a  surprise  to  even  the  best-educated  art  stu- 
dent to  see  Eembrandt,  Teniers,  Jan  Steen,  Ostade, 
Gerard  Dow,  Maeris,  Metzu,  Paul  Potter,  Wouvermans, 
Yandervelde,  and  Cuyp  on  their  own  ground.  There  is 
a  poetical  imagination,  a  skilful  management  of  light 
and  shade,  and  an  absolute  perfection  in  their  art  of 
drawing  which  are  beyond  all  praise.  Their  clearness 
and  brilliancy  of  coloring  and  their  portraits  must  be 
seen  to  be  understood.  Paintings  of  the  highest  ex- 
cellence are  in  groups  all  over  Holland.  We  studied 
them  deeply  and  constantly,  and  left  them,  in  despair 
at  not  being  able  to  see  the  half. 

Al]  this  great  city — its  houses,  canals,  and  sluices — is 
founded  on  piles.  As  Erasmus  used  to  say,  "  He  had 
reached  a  city  where  the  inhabitants  lived  like  crows  on 
the  tops  of  trees."  To  keep  the  canals  clean  costs  the 
city  several  thousand  guilders  daily.  If  it  were  not  for 
the  most  skilful  management  Amsterdam  would  be  sub- 
merged at  any  moment.  It  is  one  of  the  most  wonder- 
ful and  curious  sights  in  all  Europe.  These  water  streets, 
with  their  picturesque  craft  reflecting  the  enormous  and 


AMSTERDAM  AND   HOLLAND  281 

beautiful  trees  on  the  bank,  the  splendor  of  the  build- 
ings, the  air  of  comfort  and  of  wealth,  the  Khine  ves- 
sels and  Dutch  coasters  along  the  booms  in  front  of 
the  town,  the  ships  of  all  nations  in  the  Zuyder  Zee,  and 
a  sort  of  general  queerness  and  uiilikeness  to  anything 
else,  make  Amsterdam  eminently  interesting.  As  I 
have  said,  half  the  houses  tip  forward  at  a  most  dan- 
gerous-looking angle,  and  we  were  told  that  in  1822  the 
enormous  corn  warehouses  of  the  Dutch  East  India 
Company  actually  sank  down  into  the  mud ;  and  not  un- 
naturally, as  they  are  said  to  contain  seventy  thousand 
bushels  of  corn !  But  we  slept  soundly,  nor  did  we  fear 
submergence.  The  water  all  looks  clean  and  clear,  and 
the  beauty  of  these  water  streets  is  perfectly  delicious. 
At  a  fine  new  hotel,  called  the  Amstel,  lives  the  fa- 
mous Dr.  Metzgar,  the  man  who  has  cured  the  Empress 
Eugenie  of  her  rheumatism. 

The  drives  about  Amsterdam  are  of  course  very  lim- 
ited, but  we  were  never  tired  of  going  about  the  grand 
and  lovely  city  and  shopping  at  its  quaint  shops. 

From  here  we  went  to  Haarlem,  its  near  neighbor,; 
the  delight  of  the  rich  Amsterdam  merchant,  and  where 
the  tulip  is  raised  and  sent  as  an  article  of  commerce  all 
over  the  world. 

The  paintings  of  Franz  Hals  are  seen  in  Haarlem  as 
nowhere  else.  One  goes  to  Haarlem  to  hear  the  organ, 
see  the  tulips,  and  view  the  works  of  Franz  Hals.  This 
great  painter  is  especially  known  for  his  portraits  of 
Dutch  burgomasters,  but  he  has  the  exquisite  finish  of 
Meissonier  in  his  small  work.  One  wants  to  talk  about 
the  splendid  defence  of  Haarlem  against  the  Spaniards, 
but  it  is  necessary  to  forbear. 

The  approach  to  Haarlem  from  Amsterdam  is  over 
causeways  formed  in  fascines,  held  together  with  stakes 


283  AN   EPISTLE   TO   POSTERITY 

and  wisps  of  straw.  It  is  a  prolonged  Brooklj^n  Bridge 
built  entirely  in  the  sea.  The  churches  in  Holland  are 
not  especially  beautiful.  The  civic  architecture  in  the 
Low  Countries  is  the  beautiful  thing.  For  public  spirit 
and  for  charities  Amsterdam  is  notable. 

We  visited  Bruges  and  Ghent  on  our  way  back  to 
Belgium,  and  enjoyed  the  paintings  of  Memling  at 
Bruges.  J^othing  more  quaint  and  pretty  than  Bruges 
can  be  seen.  It  is  a  dead  town  to-day,  but  oh !  what 
spoils  of  the  past !  Once  it  was  the  Liverpool  of  the 
Middle  Ages,  rich  and  powerful  when  Antwerp  and 
Ghent  were  nothing.  Now  the  passing  traveller  finds 
a  fair  city  worthy  of  its  ancient  fame.  "  The  season  of 
her  splendor  is  gone  by."  The  traveller  must  read 
Longfellow's  poem  and  Motley's  prose  to  appreciate 
Bruges. 

But  he  goes  to  see  the  belfry  of  Bruges,  the  Cathedral, 
and  !N"otre  Dame,  where  are  the  wonderful  tombs  of 
Mary  of  Burgundy  and  of  Charles  the  Bold.  In  the 
Hospital  of  St.  John  is  the  reliquary,  or  chasse^  of  St. 
Ursula,  ornamented  with  Memling's  wonderful  paint- 
ings. 

Ghent  is  another  most  interesting  old  town,  and  this 
favorite  city  of  Charles  Y.  is  still  prosperous.  One  can- 
not but  remember  the  Battle  of  the  Golden  Spurs,  be- 
tween the  burghers  and  the  flower  of  the  French  chiv- 
alry, at  Courtrai.  It  is  a  town  full  of  memories.  From 
1297  to  the  end  of  the  eighteenth  century  the  men  of 
Ghent  were  good  fighters.  There  is  a  wonderful  bel- 
fry tower  here,  monument  of  their  wealth  and  power. 
The  bells  are  all  named.  One  is  Eylandt,  which  bore 
the  inscription,  ''  I  ring  for  birth,  death,  and  marriage, 
to  warn  of  flood  and  fire,  and  to  call  the  citizen  to 
defend  his  fatherland."     Indeed,  what  a  poetic  story 


GHENT  AND  ITS   MEMORIES  283 

might  be  made  out  of  the  bells  of  Ghent  alone !  Above 
all  these  towers  in  Ghent  hangs  the  fine  old  bell  Caro- 
lus,  named  from  Charles  Y.  It  requires  sixteen  men  to 
ring  it,  and  is  one  of  a  set  of  chimes  deliciously  reso- 
nant and  musical.  They  were  more  poetical  than  we, 
these  old  burghers ;  they  had  more  time  to  be,  although 
in  the  fourteenth  and  fifteenth  centuries  Ghent  did  a 
great  deal  of  fighting.  They  could  summon  eighty  thou- 
sand fighting -men  in  1400,  and  the  vast  streams  of 
population  were  so  tumultuous  that  the  people  of  the 
town  kept  their  children  in  at  meal-times  for  fear  that 
they  would  be  trodden  down  by  the  passing  multitude. 
'Now  the  bells  ring  at  these  same  hours ;  but,  alas !  only 
a  few  nuns,  a  few  beggars,  a  few  old  women,  passed  me 
as  I  sat  looking  up  at  the  noble  carved  work  of  the 
Cathedral  of  St.  Bavon.  Its  rich  decorations,  the  ob- 
jects which  it  contains,  are  a  study  for  a  lifetime.  Here 
are  ten  masterpieces  of  the  brothers  Yan  Eyck.  The 
beauty  and  grace  of  the  "  Yirgin  Mother"  surpass  even 
Kaphael's  pictures.  Here,  too,  lie  buried  the  painters 
Hubert  Yan  Eyck  and  his  sister  Margaret — the  great 
woman  painter  who  loved  her  profession  so  well  that 
she  refused  all  offers  of  marriage,  that  she  might  de- 
vote herself  to  art. 

In  Ghent  was  born  Charles  Y.,  and  to  the  splendid 
inheritance  of  his  grandmother,  Mary  of  Burgundy,  did 
he  owe  his  immense  empire.  We  saw  her  tomb  at 
Bruges,  a  magnificent  mausoleum  in  brass.  There  she 
lies,  pretty  little  thing.  She  died  at  twenty-seven,  and 
she  lies  with  her  little  hands  crossed  in  prayer,  the 
golden  link  from  Charles  the  Bold  to  the  greater 
Charles  Y.,  and  the  wife  of  Maximilian.  This  illustrious 
heiress  brought  to  the  house  of  Austria  a  string  of 
duchies,  counties,  and  lordships  quite  incredible.     Noth- 


284  AN   EPISTLE   TO   POSTERITY 

ing  is  left  of  her  but  the  exquisite  detail  of  her  short, 
unselfish  life  and  this  noble  tomb.  She  died  of  an  acci- 
dental fall  from  her  horse  while  out  hunting  with  Maxi- 
milian, from  whose  loving  eyes  she  concealed  her  hurt 
until  death  took  her  from  him. 

I  think  about  twenty  years'  constant  study  and  re- 
flection might  well  be  given  to  Ghent  and  Bruges.  I 
wish  all  the  foolish  days  of  my  life  which  I  have  spent 
at  American  watering-places  thinking  I  was  amused  at 
five  changes  of  dress  a  day,  dinner-parties  with  the 
thermometer  at  90°,  etc.,  could  have  been  given  to  Ghent 
and  Bruges.  What  relics  of  a  grand  and  poetical  and 
useful  race !  What  visions  of  history !  What  gems  of 
art  and  architecture !  Why,  just  one  look  at  the  Hotel 
de  Yille  in  Ghent,  with  its  fapade  of  richest  flamboy- 
ant Gothic  and  one  of  its  sides  in  the  Italian  Eenais- 
sance,  is  worth  two  balls  at  Delmonico's. 

But  I  must  remember  that  every  one  does  not  love 
old  European  towns  as  well  as  I  do ;  also,  I  must  remem- 
ber that  I  once  liked  to  dance  as  well  as  anybody.  But 
when  one  is  tired  of  dancing  let  him  go  to  Ghent  and 
think  of  Charles  Y.  and  the  Duke  of  Alva. 

The  Grand  Beguinage  is  a  feature  of  Ghent.  One 
sees  the  portraits  of  these  noble  nuns  by  Memling  and 
Franz  Ilals  everywhere;  they  are  also  the  subject  of 
many  modern  French  pictures.  Forty-three  hundred  sis- 
ters, most  of  them  noblewomen  and  women  of  wealth,  in 
black  robes  and  white  veils,  have  their  nunneries  all  over 
Belgium.  There  are  six  hundred  nuns  in  Ghent,  and  one 
can  see  them  all  in  church  every  day.  They  attend  to 
the  sick  in  hospital  and  at  the  Beguinage,  visit  and  re- 
lieve the  poor,  and  make  lace.  Almost  all  of  them  are 
rich  enough  to  keep  a  servant.  The}^  are  bound  by  no  vow, 
but  few  leave  this  rather  easy-going  monastic  seclusion. 


ANTWERP   NOT   FOEGOTTEN  285 

This  Avas  the  place  which  the  noble  James  van  Arte- 
velde  made  famous,  and  here  the  turbulent  citizens  were 
once  compelled  to  kneel  before  Charles,  and,  with  hal- 
ters round  their  necks,  demand  pardon  on  their  knees. 
This  rope  in  years  after  became  a  silken  cord,  with  a 
true-lover's  knot  in  front.  A  nobleman  of  Ghent  would 
not  dream  of  appearing  without  his  halter ;  and  so,  like 
the  order  of  the  Garter,  an  ignoble  object  became  an 
order  of  nobility. 

I  don't  know  why  I  have  skipped  Antwerp,  where 
we  went  immediately  after  Brussels.  Antwerp  is  the 
chief  military  defence  of  Belgium.  Antwerp  was  the 
home  of  Rubens,  and  Vandyke  and  Teniers,  Jordaens 
and  Quentin  Matsys.  The  Cathedral  of  Notre  Dame, 
with  its  spire  of  Mechlin  lace,  is  so  noble !  How  could 
I  have  forgotten  Antwerp  ?  JSTot  alone  for  those  great 
masterpieces  of  Rubens,  before  which  one  stands  with 
folded  hands,  breathless  with  adoration ;  not  alone  for 
that  less  well-known  but  most  interesting  composition, 
"  The  Elevation  of  the  Cross  ";  not  alone  for  "  The  Res- 
urrection," but  for  other  lesser  works  of  Rubens,  is  Ant- 
werp notable.  As  I  sat  in  the  window  of  the  hotel 
looking  up  at  the  wonderful  spire,  I  heard  the  chimes, 
and  memory  floated  back  to  the  tyranny  of  Alva;  to  the 
establishment  of  the  Inquisition,  by  which  so  many  in- 
dustrious Antwerpians  were  driven  to  England ;  to  1585, 
when  it  was  captured  by  the  Prince  of  Parma;  to  fam- 
ine ;  to  the  loss  of  its  navigation  in  1648 ;  to  the  long 
story  of  ruin  and  restoration  until  Antwerp  rose  above 
them  all  in  1830,  and  is  now  one  of  the  prominent  cities 
of  Europe  and  the  greatest  commercial  city  in  Belgium. 
Splendid  are  its  docks  and  shipping.  The  lazy  Scheldt, 
immortalized  by  Goldsmith,  is  now  the  scene  of  an  im- 
mense commerce.  ^  But  to  the  American  it  is  for  its  art 


286  AN   EPISTLE   TO   POSTERITY 

and  its  architecture  that  Antwerp  is  delightful.  The 
old  church  of  St.  Jacques  is  even  more  splendid  than 
the  cathedral  in  its  internal  decorations.  Here  is  the 
tomb  of  Kubens,  and  here  the  original  of  his  immortal 
beauty,  the  "  Chapeau  de  Faille."  The  *'  Ecstasy  "  of 
Vandyke  and  a  wonderful  "Descent  from  the  Cross" 
by  Quentin  Matsys  are  among  its  treasures.  In  the 
museum  at  Antwerp  are  some  thirty  masterpieces 
by  Kubens.  Indeed,  the  whole  town  is  his  monu- 
ment. 

I^apoleon  had  a  great  idea  of  the  importance  of  Ant- 
werp, and  he  labored  unceasingly  to  make  it  the  first 
naval  arsenal  of  the  North  Sea.  He  knew,  with  his 
vast  intelligence,  that  the  trade  of  London  would  be  at 
the  mercy  of  a  hostile  fleet  so  near  the  mouth  of  the 
Thames  as  Antwerp,  but  this  grand  idea  perished  at  St. 
Helena.  He  intended  that  Antwerp  should  rise  as  a 
province  by  itself,  and  he  said,  "France  without  the 
frontier  of  the  Khine  and  Antwerp  is  nothing."  Now 
the  city  on  the  wharf,  not  fulfilling  these  dreams,  has, 
however,  returned  to  a  fair  share  of  its  old  prosperity. 
It  has  not  yet  got  back  to  the  days  of  Charles  Y.,  when 
the  money  annually  put  into  circulation  was  500,000,000 
guilders  and  when  five  thousand  merchants  met  daily 
on  the  Exchange.  Those  were  the  days  of  Shylock! 
But  the  splendor  and  prosperity  of  the  sixteenth  cen- 
tury have  left  their  mark  on  the  palaces  of  merchant 
princes,  and  in  the  magnificent  quays  of  to-day  we  see 
what  the  nineteenth  century  can  also  do. 

The  Hague  is  one  of  those  modern  French  endorse- 
ments of  the  Napoleonic  reign.  This  luxurious  and  pretty 
residence  of  the  kings  of  the  Netherlands  only  goes  back 
to  a  very  recent  date,  yet  it  was  long  ago  the  residence  of 
the  Stadtholders,  and  it  is  agreeable,  after  the  somewhat 


THE   HAGUE   AND   ITS   TREASURES  287 

musty  hotels  of  Holland,  to  find  here  at  Scheveningen 
comforts  of  a  more  modern  town.  Here,  however,  was 
the  home  of  Barneveld ;  here  he  was  executed  in  1619. 
This  grand  pensionary  of  Holland  Avas  so  beloved  that 
after  his  death  the  people  gathered  up  the  sand  which 
was  wet  with  his  blood.  At  The  Hague  the  w^ater  is 
more  stagnant  than  in  any  other  part  of  Holland,  and 
though  near  the  sea,  the  canals  and  streams  do  not  seem 
to  empty  themselves  into  it ;  in  fact,  they  flow  from  it. 
But  the  town  is  clean  and  fresh  and  pretty.  It  has 
an  unrivalled  gallery  of  paintings,  where  the  greatest 
"short -horn"  in  existence  is  on  exhibition.  I  mean 
Paul  Potter's  "  Bull,"  the  most  remarkable  masterpiece 
of  realism  ever  painted,  and  which  has  drawn  admiring 
crowds  since  1647.  This  great  gallery  was  brought 
together  by  Louis  Bonaparte,  from  the  House  in  the 
Wood  and  other  well-known  collections,  by  purchase 
and  by  conquest.  The  Bonapartes  put  a  very  liberal 
interpretation  on  meum  and  tuum,  but  they  had  an 
artistic  eye. 

My  friends  who  were  with  me  had  great  privileges, 
being  picture  connoisseurs  and  picture-buyers ;  so  we  saw 
private  collections  as  well.  The  Baron  Stugracht  has  a 
noble  collection.  Indeed,  we  bathed  in  Dutch  art ;  and 
here  we  saw  what  we  did  not  see  elsewhere,  splendid 
collections  of  Japanese  art,  Chinese  curiosities,  and  rare 
productions  from  the  Dutch  colonies.  Considering  the 
long  connection  of  Holland  with  the  East  Indies,  there 
are  few  evidences  of  these  things  in  Holland  to  the 
careless  observer.  The  bed  on  which  the  Czar  Peter 
slept  at  Zaandam,  the  waistcoat  of  William  III.  of  Eng- 
land, and  the  Beggars'  bowl,  which  forms  a  part  of  the 
insignia  of  the  confederate  chiefs  of  Holland  who  freed 
Holland  from  the  y^oke  of  Spain,  are  shown  at  the  Mu- 


288  AN  EPISTLE  TO  POSTERITY 

seum;  also  the  dress  that  William,  Prince  of  Orange, 
wore  on  the  day  when  he  was  murdered. 

Here,  at  the  then  village  of  The  Hague,  were  murdered 
the  noble  brothers  De  Witt ;  here  the  first  citizen  of  the 
richest  country  in  the  world,  the  victim  of  calumny,  the 
profound  statesman  who  baffled  the  encroaching  forces 
of  France,  who  frightened  London  with  the  roar  of  his 
cannon  on  the  Thames,  the  noble  Cornelius  de  Witt, 
was  torn  to  pieces  by  an  infuriated  mob  on  the  sus- 
picion that  he  had  conspired  to  assassinate  William  of 
Orange. 

From  The  Hague  we  went  to  Scheveningen,  a  water- 
ing-place much  frequented  by  the  Dutch  aristocracy. 
The  fisher  folk  wear  a  costume  and  drive  a  one-dog 
chaise ;  we  pitied  the  poor  dogs.  Scheveningen  was  the 
place  where  Charles  II.  embarked  for  England.  Here 
the  Prince  of  Orange  landed  in  1813,  just  before  the 
downfall  of  the  Bonapartes ;  and  here,  much  earlier,  the 
famous  Yan  Tromp  was  killed.  We  did  not  care  much 
for  this  sea-side  place.  It  is  too  new  and  too  crude,  but 
I  beg  pardon  of  those  who  do  find  it  charming. 

We  went  back  to  Brussels,  which  was  our  pied-d- 
terre,  our  rallying-point,  our  place  to  leave  our  trunks ; 
and  thence  to  Ostend,  the  gayest  and  most  crowded  of 
Belgian  watering-places.  There  the  red  parasol  was 
born ;  there  the  fourteen  thousand  bathers  walk  on  the 
sand  in  every  color  of  the  rainbow.  There  is  the  spot 
where  Ouida's  novel  of  Moths  might  have  been  written. 
It  is  gay,  French,  and  dissipated,  but  boasts  a  magnifi- 
cent Ploje,  a  walk  unrivalled  for  security  and  splendor. 
The  bathing-machines,  drawn  by  horses,  may  be  counted 
by  thousands ;  and  the  poor,  tired  bathing  men,  women, 
and  horses  seem  to  be  worked  to  death.  Here  we 
found  the  best  hotel  in  all  our  wanderings.     It  was  a 


FAREWELL   TO   HOLLAND  289 

famous  place  for  good  dinners  and  gay  casinos.  The 
King  of  the  Belgians  was  there,  and  we  met  many- 
American  and  English  friends.  For  a  week's  visit  to 
the  sea  I  know  nothing  like  it,  and  we  refreshed  our- 
selves immensely.  But  there  were  no  drives,  so  we 
had  very  little  variety ;  we  ^vere  continually  thinking 
of  our  dear  Holland,  of  our  charming  journey,  of  the 
noble  galleries,  of  the  poetic  "  Water,  water  everywhere, 
nor  any  drop  to  drink,"  for  even  Amsterdam  has  to  be 
supplied  artificially  by  a  company  from  Haarlem. 

We  regretted  that  we  had  not  travelled  by  a  treck- 
schuit,  or  day  boat,  on  the  canal ;  also  that  we  had  not 
bought  a  Dutch  gold  head-dress,  and  that  we  had  not 
found  the  women  more  beautiful.  I  am  afraid  we 
shall  have  to  acknowledge,  with  the  author  of  VatheJc, 
that  there  is  a  certain  "  oysterishness  of  eye,"  a  certain 
flabbiness  of  complexion,  which  would  tell  of  ah 
aquatic  surrounding,  in  the  women  of  Holland ;  but  we 
found  their  country  so  interesting  that  we  forgave  the 
inhabitants  for  not  being  lovely.  Far  from  agreeing 
with  old  Yoltaire  in  his  satiric  '^Adieu,  canaux,  ca- 
nards, canailles,''^  we  said :  "  Farewell,  brave  Holland, 
land  of  liberty,  land  of  industry,  ingenuity,  and  pa- 
tience! Farewell,  you  curious  polders,  or  morasses, 
often  thirty-two  feet  below  the  level  of  the  sea,  drained, 
partitioned  off  by  dikes  and  ramparts,  turned  into 
fields  of  wonderful  fertility !  Farewell,  beautiful  sum- 
mer-houses and  parks,  and  huiteii  plaatsen,  country- 
seats,  perfect  pictures  of  prettiness,  with  meandering 
w^alks  and  fantastically  cut  parterres,  with  a  deep  fish- 
pond in  the  centre  of  the  park !  Farewell,  trim  box 
iDorders  and  trees  cut  in  shapes!  Farewell,  poetic, 
dreamy  canals,  and  dark  -  brown  ships,  and  strangely 
quaint  sails,  and  a  thousand  dreamy  Flying  Dutchmen 

19 


290  AN   EPISTLE   TO   POSTERITY 

in  the  offing!  Farewell,  noble  old  mediaeval  houses, 
half  tipping  over  in  front !  Farewell,  noble  galleries  of 
the  old  Dutch  masters,  never  to  be  sufficiently  admired! 
Farewell,  noble  Amsterdam,  who  gave  New  York  its 
first  name !  Farewell,  Holland,  land  of  calm  delights !" 
May  you  ever,  like  your  heroic  lion, 

"Swim,  and  keep  your  head  above  water." 


CHAPTER  XVI 

In  Praise  of  Aix-les- Bains— Its  Cures  and  Its  Amusements— Rous- 
seau's House — La  Grande  Chartreuse  and  Its  Famous  Liqueur — 
An  Exercise  in  Russian  Linguistics— Tlie  Marriage  of  tlie  Due 
d'Aosta— A  Mediaeval  F^te— Tlie  Queen  of  Italy  and  Her  Royal 
Graces— The  House  of  Savoy  and  Its  Early  Home  at  Aix— English 
Visitors — Princess  Beatrice's  Birthday. 

After  seven  summers  passed  at  Aix  -  les  -  Bains  for 
rheumatism,  I  feel  that  I  owe  it  to  history  and  to  the 
afflicted  to  give  a  somewhat  detailed  account  of  its  va- 
ried charms  and  peculiar  advantages  as  a  health  resort. 

Some  one  has  said  that  Aix  was  a  place  for  kings, 
actors,  and  gamblers.  Perhaps  it  is  as  well  to  begin 
with  our  latest  royal  sensation,  the  King  of  Greece,  a 
most  gentlemanly  person,  amiable  and  sympathetic,  and 
devoted  to  his  favorite  and  successful  physician.  Dr. 
Brachet,  who  gave  the  King  a  succession  of  beautiful 
fetes,  leading  him  through  these  mountain  glens  by 
torchlight  and  fireworks,  as  well  as  throwing  open  his 
fine  chateau  of  Gresy  for  his  entertainment.  We  listen 
to  delightful  Colonne  concerts,  and  see  Roiiieo  and  Ju- 
liet^ Carmen^  and  any  number  of  comedies  well  played ; 
we  have  a  Viennese  lady  orchestra,  and,  of  course,  w^ith 
the  casinos  devoted  to  baccarat,  there  are  plenty  of  gam- 
^blers.  One  hundred  and  fifty  years  ago  the  game  of 
faro  was  invented  here,  and  it  was  a  great  resort  of  the 
dissolute  nobles  of  the  time  of  Louis  XY. 

Aix  is  mentioned  in  Grammont's  memoirs,  and  there 


AN   EPISTLE   TO   POSTERITY 


is  a  long  account  of  the  gambling-hell  in  that  forbidden 
book,  Cazenova.  Here  baccarat  flourishes,  and  perhaps 
the  most  beautiful  rooms  in  Europe  for  that  purpose 
are  the  Cercle  and  Yilla  des  Fleurs,  and  others  now 
thrown  open. 

Savoy  is  a  very  Catholic  country,  and  every  monas- 
tery has  its  legend,  every  hillside  and  waterfall  its 
pretty  story.  We  are  fond  of  going  for  picnics  at  the 
Chateau  of  Chdtillon,  whose  family  once  gave  a  pope  to 
the  Church.  Chatillon  had  not  only  a  pope,  but  a 
beautiful  young  lady.  Noble  lords  sued  in  vain  (times 
were  so  different),  for  she  loved  a  humble  fisherman  of 
the  Ehone.  These  great,  grand  lovers  came  frequently 
to  Chatillon,  but  the  handsome  fisherman  only  appeared 
at  intervals.  She  determined  to  go  after  him  and 
arouse  his  insensible  heart.  But  how  to  reach  him  ?  The 
Lake  of  Bourget  was  then  separated  from  the  Ehone 
by  impassable  morasses.  There  were  no  canals,  still 
less  any  steamboats,  no  railroads  in  the  eleventh  cen- 
tury ;  and  how  to  get  to  her  fisherman  of  the  Ehone 
was  a  problem.  It  is  said  that  she  conceived  the  proj- 
ect of  making  a  canal  through  the  morass,  and  that 
she  and  her  maid  cut  their  way  through  with  their 
scissors,  which  sounds  improbable.  It  only  carries  out 
the  universal  history  of  Aix,  that  women  have  ever 
been  a  greater  factor  than  man  in  amusement  and  en- 
terprise. Aix  is  indeed  alive.  Eussian  princesses,  Eng- 
lish countesses,  officers  of  the  Guard,  the  adventuresses 
of  all  nations,  gambling  duchesses,  throng  the  table 
daily,  and  thence  to  the  gaming-tables.  At  the  eta- 
llissement  what  a  motley  group,  hurrying  hither  for 
health !  Of  our  own  country  people  Mrs.  Astor  and 
Mr.  and  Mrs.  Bancroft  Davis  are  the  most  distinguished 
visitors. 


A  HEROINE  AT  AIX-LES-BAINS  293 

In  the  process  of  the  cure  I  met  a  heroine.  She  is  a 
young  Parisian,  who  is  having  a  lame  arm  pulled  into 
place.  She  is  tall,  of  a  perfect  figure,  with  a  fine,  rosy 
complexion,  blue  eyes,  which  flash  vividly  when  she 
talks,  an  exquisitely  sweet  mouth,  and  a  chin  softly 
dimpled.  She  has  a  swaying  grace,  and  when  she 
walks  to  her  bath  her  hair  reaches  to  her  feet.  I  see 
her  at  the  bath  before  she  disappears  in  the  closed  cab- 
inet. Her  foot  has  the  Spanish  slenderness  and  instep, 
her  voice  is  deep;  she  talks  contralto.  She  has  but 
to  say,  "  It  is  rather  rainy  to-day,"  and  your  heart  is 
won. 

And  oh!  she  is  so  firm.  She  does  not  cry  out  under 
the  torture !  The  doctor  holds  her  with  his  strong  arm 
while  the  masseuse  pulls  her  arm  into  place.  She  seems 
to  take  a  moral  chloroform,  and  only  a  dreadful  pallor 
tells  what  she  suffers.  "  Quelle  bravoure,"  the  doctor 
says — "  how  much  braver  you  are  than  men !"  This 
girl  heightens  every  charm  by  a  most  becoming  cos- 
tume. She  has  an  air  of  power,  of  place,  of  taking 
everything  for  her  own,  and  is  a  natural  queen.  Yet  I ; 
have  seen  nothing  more  soft,  sweet,  and  amiable  than 
she  is ;  as  a  friend  she  is  fascinating.  Not  so  learned  as 
my  Swedish  friend,  the  latter  character  is  still  sparkling 
and  intelligent.  If  you  should  put  a  knife  into  the 
French  girl's  learning  it  would  explode  and  blow  away 
like  an  omelette  soufflee  ;  but  she  is  bright  and  reads  in- 
telligently. She  is  very  popular  with  her  own  sex,  and 
every  man  is  in  love  with  her.  Yet  she  is  thirty  and 
unmarried,  and  says  she  will  die  an  old  maid.  Ameri- 
cans, to  the  rescue !  This  fine  creature,  born  for  the 
splendid  side  of  the  tapestry,  has  had  to  take  some 
of  the  hardest  knocks  of  fortune,  I  imagine,  and  has 
learned  how  to  suffer  and  to  endure.    She  has  had  a  life 


294  AN   EPISTLE  TO   POSTEEITY 

of  fashionable  triumph  and  a  heart-break.  George  Sand 
had  the  one  supreme  conviction  that  all  relations  of  man 
to  woman  were  selfish  ones.  I  should  not  be  disposed 
to  forgive  the  man  who  has  perhaps  wrecked  the  happi- 
ness of  this  fine  creature. 

There  are  comparatively  few  men  at  Aix,  and  very  few 
who  enter  the  charmed  circle.  Of  course  there  are  any 
number  of  gamblers  and  fast  men,  but  few  who  join 
our  dinners  and  our  excursions.  The  English  captains 
who  come  here  to  be  bathed  and  cured  of  gout  and  rheu- 
matism and  the  results  of  wounds  in  Egypt  appear  to 
be  horribly  bored,  and  so  are  those  who  talk  to  them. 
They  are  in  the  condition  of  Artemus  Ward,  who  said, 
"  I'm  saddest  when  I  sing,  and  so  are  those  who  hear 
me."  I  had  to  talk  to  one  of  these,  and  I  went  through 
the  ut-re-mi-fa-sol  of  conversation;  tried  him  on  poli- 
tics, on  war,  on  music,  on  the  Prince  of  Wales,  on  beau- 
ty, on  his  cure,  and  failed  to  elicit  a  spark  of  intelli- 
gence or  sympathy.  Finally  I  got  on  hunting  in  Scot- 
land, when  he  unbent  and  talked  for  six  minutes  con- 
secutively. 

A  far  more  amusing  companion  is  old  Toole,  the  Eng- 
lish actor,  who  is  here  for  his  gout.  He  is  a  very  intel- 
ligent, amiable  person,  and  always  does  his  best  to  be 
amusing.  He  is  fond  of  making  up  faces  above  the  box 
in  which  he  takes  his  Bertholet  bath,  and  the  bathers 
go  to  see  him  grinning  and  being  funny.  He  is  very 
much  attached  to  Mr.  Irving,  and  very  much  interested 
in  hearing  about  his  American  trip. 

The  greatest  sufferers  here  from  nervous  prostration 
are  women,  and  American  women !  There  is  something 
in  the  fulness  of  life — that  brimming  excess  of  emotion, 
thought,  effort,  enjoyment,  and  work  which  only  reaches 
an  American  woman.    It  is  that  exaltation  which  comes 


THE   ATTRACTIONS    OF  AIX-LES-BAINS  295 

from  intellectual  contact,  that  supreme  excitement  of 
society,  that  generous  outgiving  of  sympathy,  the  nec- 
essary wear  and  tear  of  daily  life  (which  English  women 
are  spared),  which  wear  out  the  health  of  an  American 
woman  so  soon.  A  woman's  life  is  gone  before  she 
knows  that  she  has  been  spending  her  principal.  That 
splendid  investment,  which  should  have  lasted  her  life, 
has  been  squandered,  and  on  whom  ?  On  friends  she 
loves  and  would  die  for  ?  ISTo,  on  the  sordid  call  and  the 
sense  of  duty.  That  powerful  electric  battery  which 
we  call  our  nervous  system  responds  most  faithfully 
until  its  motive  power  is  used  up.  "  Those  white  threads 
called  nerves  are  the  conductors  of  force,  the  primary 
engines  of  motion,  the  arbiters  of  pain,  the  dispensers  of 
joy."  Alas  that  they  cease  to  be  anything  but  arbiters 
of  pain  after  a  few  years'  overuse !  The  cure  here  is 
magical ;  the  lame  throw  away  their  crutches,  the  stoop- 
ing stand  up  straight,  the  suffering  faces  grow  smooth, 
and  all  that  made  us  miserable  "goes  to  disappear." 
The  weather  is  like  that  of  America — warm  with  fre- 
quent thunder-showers,  cool  nights,  and  an  atmosphere 
like  that  of  the  White  Mountains  at  night.  Aix  re- 
joices in  most  delightfully  healthy  surroundings  of 
farms,  vineyards,  and  fresh  water,  the  most  delicious 
fruit,  and  the  best  hotels  in  the  world. 

The  drives  are  endless  and  beautiful.  E'o  one  can 
exhaust  Aix  in  many  excursions;  indeed,  in  August, 
after  a  long  rain,  such  freshness,  such  skies,  such  views, 
are  not  to  be  found  out  of  Paradise.  Of  course  these 
valleys  and  mountains  are  not  so  grand  as  Switzerland, 
but  there  is  a  unique  prettiness  which  enchants  the  eye, 
appeals  to  the  fancy,  wins  and  keeps  the  heart.  But 
there  is  the  great  break  of  the  Alps,  through  which  runs 
the  rail  to  Turin,  and  how  incomprehensibly  grand  are 


296  AN   EPISTLE    TO    POSTERITY 

those  mighty  sentinels  which  stand  between  Aix  and 
Chambery,  the  city  lying  like  a  diadem  on  a  velvet 
cushion ;  the  old  chateau,  with  its  flying  buttresses, 
dominating  the  sweet,  picturesque,  curious,  beautiful  old 
town!  Here  one  can  find  bric-a-brac  and  a  delicious 
dinner  at  the  Hotel  de  France.  Dr.  Brachet,  the  host 
of  Aix,  frequently  brings  his  parties  hither.  One  of 
the  most  interesting  expeditions  from  Chambery  is  to 
the  house  of  Jean  Jacques  Kousseau,  Les  Charmettes — 
a  delightful  valley  approached  through  shady  groves. 
The  flower-garden  is  still  fresh.  Byron  said  of  it, 
"  Wildly  lonely,  grand,  and  beautiful,  the  place  puts  one 
out  of  conceit  with  himself  and  the  world,  and  in  love 
with  solitude  and  reverie." 

Yery  strange  is  the  change  from  these  sombre,  poetic 
forests  back  to  gay  little  Aix,  its  casinos,  bright  flowers, 
music,  and  noise.  Every  one  shouts  aloud — the  coach- 
man cracks  his  whip,  that  every  sheep,  goat,  donkey 
may  get  out  of  the  way.  Eussian  princesses  elbow 
grave  lady  abbesses;  two  Turks  in  fez  caps  drive  si- 
lently by ;  pretty  Parisians,  daintily  shod,  trip  over  the 
sulphurous  canals ;  the  Italian  marquis  goes  out  walk- 
ing with  the  French  Duke  and  German  Count. 

But  we  are  not  content,  we  must  get  into  the  country 
again. 

The  Mont  du  Chat,  the  green  mountains,  apparently 
seamed  with  rocky  ribbons ;  the  thatched  cottages, where 
dwell  the  contented  peasants ;  the  humble  auberge,  where 
the  wayfarer  gets  bread  and  wine  and  cheese ;  the  com- 
fortable homes  of  the  small  proprietors ;  the  beautiful 
villas  of  Count  Menabrea  and  Baron  Blanc — everything 
is  a  subject  for  a  water-color,  from  the  thatched  roof 
rich  in  lichens  up  to  the  old  Savoyard  chateau  a  thou- 
sand years  old.     So  we  pass  some  mediaeval  church  with 


THE   LAKE   OF   BOURGET  397 

its  memorial  cross,  "  A  Notre  Dame  du  Bon  Secours"; 
past  fields  and  vineyards,  now,  alas !  all  ruined  by  the 
rain — seeing  the  peasant  women  washing  their  clothes 
in  the  stream,  the  gay  and  jolly  peasant  girls  with  red 
cheeks  and  white  teeth  and  "  hands  which  offer  early 
flowers  " — to  the  Lake  of  Bourget. 

Nothing  can  be  prettier  than  this  gem  of  the  moun- 
tains, and  it  holds  the  biggest  of  trout,  bream,  lota, 
perch,  eels,  and  carp.  To  say  that,  with  its  peacock- 
green-blue  tint,  its  mysterious  j)7K)fondeur^  "  Bourget  is 
beautiful,"  is  to  utter  the  most  dreary  of  commonplaces. 
It  is  a  dream  of  beauty,  and  on  its  bank  is  dropped  the 
old  Abbey  of  Hautecombe. 

We  wind  up  to  the  top  of  the  Col  du  Chat,  gaining  a 
magnificent  view  as  we  go,  and  the  air  becoming  more 
and  more  invigorating.  Aix  lies  below  us,  a  pretty 
little  city,  with  its  great  health  etablissement.  Many 
a  woman  who  has  left  a  part  of  her  youth  in  the 
atria  of  the  gay  capitols  comes  here  to  recuperate ;  all 
the  lame  and  sore-throated  ones  come  here  and  are 
cured.  The  hotels  are  perfect.  There  is  no  lack  of 
temptation  to  those  who  love  the  good  things  of  this 
world  in  moderation  (or  even  too  much)  at  Aix. 

Truly  Aix-les-Bains  has  every  advantage — scenery  for 
the  lovers  of  nature,  history  for  the  learned,  gay  and 
varied  society  to  attract  the  curious.  Monks,  nuns, 
priests,  soldiers,  kings,  and  queens  walk  these  little 
crooked  stone-lined  streets,  either  bent  on  pleasure  or 
health,  perhaps  on  both,  and  are  cured  of  rheumatism, 
bronchitis,  paralysis,  or  sleeplessness,  or  a  mind  dis- 
eased. The  great  thermal  establishment  has  its  atom- 
ized vapor-baths,  its  douches,  and  its  swimming-baths. 
Disease  flies  away  from  this  arsenal  of  health.  Marlioz 
is  at  hand  with  its  hot  alum  springs,  Challes  has  its 


398  AN   EPISTLE   TO   POSTEEITY 

intensified  sulphur,  and  yet  there  is  not  a  bad  smell  in 
this  lovely  neighborhood. 

Away  at  the  south  are  the  Dauphinois  Alps,  cov- 
ered  with  snow.  We  are  apt  to  have  a  cool  turn  oc- 
casionally, a  sharp  turn  of  cold  weather  after  the  in- 
tensely heavy  rains.  But  nothing  can  be  raore  exquisite 
than  the  climate.  The  splendid  vegetation  spreading  to 
the  foot  of  these  stone  mountains  produces  an  extraor- 
dinary variety,  with  here  and  there  the  villa  of  the  old 
local  nobility — famous  old  titles.  A  proud  and  isolated 
grandeur  is  characteristic  of  Savoy. 

I  have  made  the  famous  expedition  to  La  Grande 
Chartreuse,  about  twenty  miles  from  Aix.  The  drive 
from  Saint  -  Laurent -du- Pont  is,  perhaps,  one  of  the 
most  picturesque  in  Europe.  You  go  ever  on  and  up- 
ward, through  astounding  granite  peaks,  immense  for- 
ests, and  rushing  waterfalls  until  you  reach  the  splen- 
did plateau  where  the  pious  Bruno  founded  his  grand 
old  monastery.  Here  the  Chartreux  leads  his  solitary 
life,  and  here  at  midnight  the  sound  of  prayer  and 
praise  has  been  heard  for  a  thousand  years.  The  his- 
torian of  the  order  says : 

"  At  the  time  when  the  midnight  assassin  is  prowling 
and  committing  his  deadly  crimes,  when  the  debauchee  is 
wasting  his  life  in  feasting,  when  the  gambler  is  spend- 
ing the  inheritance  of  his  fathers,  when  all  crime  stalks 
abroad,  the  hour  of  midnight,  then  does  the  solitary 
pray  for  the  souls  of  those  who  never  pray  for  them- 
selves." It  is  a  village  in  stone  this  monastery,  and 
no  woman  is  permitted  to  go  farther  than  the  chapel. 
However,  Queen  Victoria  was  invited  to  see  the  cells, 
and  it  was  considered  a  great  concession.  The  brothers 
are  very  rich  from  the  sale  of  the  liqueur  Chartreuse, 
whose  golden  drops  are  distilled  from  the  flowers  in 


THE  MONKS   OF  CHARTKEUSE  299 

the  meadow,  and  whose  rich  heart  of  good  cheer  is 
born  amid  the  sternest  asceticism.  It  is  a  curious  mis- 
sion and  history  that  of  this  famous  liqueur,  and  I  never 
see  a  glass  of  it  at  a  gay  dinner  but  I  remember  the 
white-robed,  prayerful  monks  who  pass  days  without 
speaking,  except  to  say,  as  they  dig  their  graves,  "  Mes 
freres,  il  faut  mourir."  When  a  brother  dies  and  is 
buried  the  other  brothers  do  not  know  of  it,  excepting 
the  few  who  administer  the  funeral  rites.  It  is  a  place 
where  religion  has  stifled  the  language  of  the  heart, 
where  man  strives  to  lose  himself  in  the  infinite.  Strange 
to  say,  it  attracts  yearly  many  sad  and  earnest  souls, 
and  they  do,  in  their  way,  a  vast  deal  of  good  Avith 
their  money  and  with  their  prayers. 

A  ludicrous  anecdote  was  told  me  of  an  American 
brother  who  had  joined  them.  He  got  tired  of  hearing 
"  We  must  all  die,"  every  hour ;  so  in  passing  a  pious 
monk  who  thus  saluted  him  he  answered,  feeling  in  per- 
fect health  himself,  "  We  must  all  die !  no,  you  bet !" 

They  are  healthy,  and  live  to  be  a  very  great  age. 
Each  brother  has  his  little  garden  where  he  can  raise 
vegetables  for  his  simple  meal. 

At  Aix  most  people  wear  plain  clothes,  go  off  on 
long,  healthful  excursions,  drive  in  shabby  carriages, 
drop  into  theatre  and  Casino  in  a  humble,  unpretending 
manner,  and  make  agreeable  friendships  sans  gene.  Life 
gains  a  new  value,  as  we  thus  pick  up  the  pine  cones 
in  the  forests  with  which  to  later  on  illuminate  the  fire- 
side at  home. 

Having  been  six  weeks  at  Aix,  where  the  sun  generally 
shines,  but  where  it  has  lately  been  cold  and  autumnal, 
it  is  almost  a  tragedy  to  hear  the  newly  arrived  English 
speak  of  the  wet  summer  to  which  they  have  been  ex- 
posed.   One  writer  says:    ''When  we  wanted  three 


800  AN   EPISTLE   TO   POSTERITY 

weeks  of  sweltering  sunshine  to  ripen  the  wheat  in  the 
ear,  we  had  a  deluge  of  chilling  rain  that  turned  all  the 
low-lying  lands  into  vast  lagoons.  The  fields  in  Essex 
are  swamps,  in  which  a  ruined  grain  crop  lies  rotting  in 
putrid,  stagnant  marshes."  Kuskin  says :  "  An  Enghsh 
sun  is  like  a  bad  half-crown  at  the  bottom  of  a  basin  of 
dirty  water,  at  best."  Lord  Tennyson,  speaking  of  Edin- 
burgh, bewails  the  "  bitter  east  wind  and  misty  summer 
of  the  gray  old  metroplis  of  the  north."  What  must  it  be 
now  ?  The  wheat  crop  of  England  will  fall  33  per  cent, 
below  the  average ! 

"  Damp  has  become  a  deluge ;  the  straw  is  ruined,  and 
lies  decomposing  in  a  veritable  slough  of  despond. 
Barley  and  oats  have  done  better.  Beans  and  pease 
are  but  a  poor  crop ;  the  potato,  though  abundant,  is 
blighted  by  disease ;  never  was  a  worse  hay  crop ;  hops 
are  poor."  So  say  the  English  papers.  God  help  the 
small  farmers ! 

There  has  been  a  Princess  Dolgourka  here,  who  was 
supposed  to  be  a  member  of  that  royal,  unfortunate 
family  one  of  whom  was  the  widow  of  the  Czar.  Some 
Russians  have  interpreted  for  us  the  feminine  and  mas- 
culine of  Russian  names.  The  Governor  of  Moscow  is 
the  Prince  Dolgouroukoff,  his  wife  the  Princess  Dol- 
gourka. But  that  again  is  said  to  be  an  error,  and  that 
it  is  only  some  Polish  names  which  change  their  femi- 
nines,  as  the  Count  Potocki  and  the  Countess  Potocka, 
In  Russia,  generally  speaking,  the  termination  "off" 
changes  to  a  feminine  "  ova."  One  of  the  best  dancers 
at  the  theatre  is  Mademoiselle  Froloff.  If  she  were 
married  she  would  be  Madame  Frolova.  But  if  one 
marries  a  Menshikoff,  as  they  are  princes,  she  would 
be  Princess  Menshikoff,  not  Menshika.  A  language 
which  is  complicated  by  degrees  of  rank  as  well  as  de- 


EMINENT  VISITORS   TO   AIX-LES-BAINS  301 

grees  of  grammar  and  gender  must  be  a  hard  one  to 
master. 

I  have  just  heard  a  Colonne  concert  composed  entirely 
of  works  of  Benjamin  Godard,  an  author  of  great  orig- 
inaUty  as  to  operas,  songs,  waltzes,  overtures,  and  etudes. 
Some  of  his  songs  were  well  interpreted  by  the  admira- 
ble artist  Madame  Colonne. 

We  have  been  listening  to  the  music  of  the  Boi 
(TYs,  that  remarkable  story  of  an  opera  which  waited 
thirty  years  for  recognition.  M.  Paravey,  the  manager 
of  the  Opera  Comique,  however,  will  bring  it  out  in 
splendid  style  at  the  theatre  in  the  faubourg,  where  the 
Opera  Comique  in  Paris  is  now  installed  until  the  new 
building  on  the  Boulevard  is  ready. 

Lord  and  Lady  Elgin,  of  London ;  Lady  Marcia 
Cholmondeley ;  Count  Belgioso,  Milan;  Lady  Anna 
Chandos-Pole ;  Count  Ghyka,  Koumania ;  Prince  de  Bel- 
monte,  Kome ;  Viscount  Oxenbridge,  London ;  Count- 
ess Schaefenberg,  Austria ;  Lord  and  Lady  Oxenbridge 
— are  among  the  recent  arrivals.  This  gives  some  idea 
of  the  cosmopolitan  character  of  Aix.  I  transcribe  one 
of  my  old  letters  from  Aix-les-Bains  of  September  1, 
1888: 

"When  Dr.  Oliver  Wendell  Holmes  was  taking  his 
scholarly  thought  and  his  courtly  smile  through  the 
English  court  he  said  to  a  friend  that  the  ^  royal  family 
are  the  best  people  in  the  world,  excepting  those  of 
Beverly  Farms.'  I  have  thought  of  that  many  times, 
as  I  have  seen  various  members  of  them  in  Europe;  and 
since  I  have  seen  the  quiet,  unobtrusive  royalties  here 
from  other  places  I  have  observed  that  same  excel- 
lence in  them. 

"The  Duke  and  Duchess  of  Montpensier  are  here 
now,  and  ver}'-  much  such  people  as  we  should  like  to 


303  AN   EPISTLE   TO   POSTERITY 

meet  at  home.  We  have  also  a  number  of  very  dis- 
tinguished people  who  are  not  royalties,  including  Mr. 
H.  W.  Smith,  the  prime  seller  of  books  and  the  leader 
of  the  House  of  Commons.  We  have  also  a  councillor 
from  China,  who  has  been  trying  to  obtain  concessions 
from  the  Flowery  Kingdom,  and  so  on. 

"  We  hear  much  of  the  life  of  the  President  of  the 
French  Kepublic  at  Fontainebleau.  While  during  the 
reign  of  l^apoleon  III.  very  few  members  of  the  nobili- 
ty of  patrician  France  would  ever  pass  the  imperial 
threshold,  they  now  forget  and  forgive,  and  are  ready 
to  visit  the  president.  It  is  a  new  departure,  and  Ma- 
dame Carnot  might  organize  fetes  in  the  gardens  with 
the  docility  of  a  courtier  and  the  imagination  of  an  ar- 
tist of  the  eighteenth  century,  if  she  wished  to. 

"  But  she  knows  that  the  day  of  omnipotent  queens 
and  pleasure-loving  chatelaines  is  over.  All  those  who 
once  were  as  powerful  as  Caesar,  as  beautiful  as  Cleo- 
patra, were  destined  to  see  their  laurels  drop,  their 
sceptre  fall,  their  empire  diminish.  A  woman  holds 
her  power  to  charm  as  Balzac's  hero  held  the  Peau 
de  Chagrin.  Every  day  it  shrinks,  until  at  last  there  is 
nothing  left ;  and  when  a  woman  had  a  throne  she  was 
obliged  to  own  that  even  that  make-weight  did  not 
bring  permanency.  A  queen  driven  from  her  throne, 
naked,  in  winter  snows,  like  Elizabeth  of  Hungary,  suf- 
ers  more  than  she  who  wanders  from  a  snow-beleaguered 
hut  every  day ;  the  woman  who  has  had  the  most  suffers 
the  most.     Poor  Eugenie ! 

'^  Madame  Carnot  is  not  using  her  power  or  her  oppor- 
tunity like  Marie  Antoinette.  She  is  too  wise  a  little 
woman  of  the  nineteenth  century.  She  does  not  think 
it  sensible  to  live  a  few  minutes  with  the  stars  in  order 
to  drop  down  to  the  stones. 


ROYAL   WEDDING  AT   TURIN  303 

"  We  talk  and  think  much  of  Count  Crispi,  the  Italian 
diplomat.  And  this  coming  marriage  of  the  Duke 
d'Aosta,  which  is  to  unite  the  Bonapartes  still  more 
closely  to  Italy,  brings  him  into  unusual  promi- 
nence." 

I  have  seen  a  number  of  brilliant  fetes  in  Europe,  be- 
ginning with  the  illumination  of  Venice  in  September, 
1869,  for  the  beautiful  Empress  Eugenie;  but  I  think 
the  week  at  Turin  which  I  spent  looking  at  the  me- 
diaeval festivities,  invoked  in  honor  of  that  curious  event 
the  marriage  of  the  Prince  Amadeo,  Duke  d'Aosta,  to 
his  niece,  Letitia  Bonaparte,  was,  perhaps,  the  most  in- 
teresting in  the  way  of  sight-seeing.  In  the  first  place, 
the  near  relationship  of  the  royal  pair  shocked  us,  but 
as  we  had  not  been  consulted  we  could  not  be  blamed 
for  that.  However,  it  is  a  good  way  to  begin  an  emotion 
by  being  shocked;  and  then  the  groom  was  decidedly 
the  most  interesting  and  romantic-looking  character  of 
his  day ;  a  sort  of  Hamlet,  with  his  fine  attenuated  feat- 
ures overshadowed  by  a  mysterious  sadness;  elegant, 
princely,  tall,  and  graceful.  He,  the  ex-King  of  Spain, 
was  of  a  religious  turn  of  mind,  and  in  his  youth  had 
aspired  to  be  a  priest,  a  monk,  a  cardinal,  perhaps  Pope. 
But  his  roj^al  father  preferred  a  career  in  this  world 
for  his  handsome  youngest  son,  so  he  had  married  him 
to  the  young,  high-spirited  heiress  Maria  de  Cisterna ; 
and  she,  poor  thing,  after  giving  him  three  boys,  had 
died — killed,  it  was  said,  by  her  sufferings  in  Spain  after 
two  years  of  queen  ship.  The  royal  couple  had  a  very 
near  thing  in  getting  away  with  their  lives  from  Madrid. 
It  was  said  that  her  husband  always  wore  her  hair  in  a 
bracelet  around  his  wrist,  and  that  he  was  practically 
inconsolable. 

That  this  nineteenth-century  Hamlet  was  to  marry^ 


804  AN   EPISTLE  TO   POSTERITY 

and  his  own  sister's  daughter  at  that,  surprised  and  be- 
wildered Europe.  The  Pope  gave  his  permission,  and 
King  Humbert,  devotedly  attached  to  his  brother,  de- 
termined that  the  wedding  should  be  the  proudest  cere- 
monial of  the  age. 

At  the  royal  charges  every  theatrical  company  was 
sent  to  Turin,  where  for  a  week  they  played  in  corners 
of  the  great  squares,  in  temporary  booths,  the  plays  of 
the  great  Italian  writers.  As  in  the  days  of  Dante,  one 
could  wander  by  and  hear  them.  The  Opera  House  was 
open  every  evening  with  the  best  singers. 

Turin  was  very  fond  of  Amadeo,  for  he  lived  there, 
and  his  manners  were  most  attractive.  He  and  his  hand- 
some Prince  Emanuel  were  always  walking  the  streets, 
bowing  to  every  one,  and  followed  by  vivas.  Turin 
could  not  sufficiently  decorate  itself  with  banners,  flow- 
ers, flags,  ribbons,  and  roses.  Triumphal  arches  opened 
every  street  whose  long  vista  ended  in  the  sublime 
Alpine  vision  of  Monte  Eosa.  The  bands  of  music,  the 
files  of  soldiers,  the  illuminated  evenings  when  the 
"wandering  Po"  of  Goldsmith's  time  gave  back  the 
mirrored  torches — all  was  beauty.  They  can  do  these 
things  in  Italy.  Nature  supplements  them — it  is  all  festa. 

Every  day  some  royalty  would  arrive.  Queen  Maria 
Pia  of  Portugal,  youngest  daughter  of  Yictor  Emanuel, 
came  first,  with  her  husband  and  son.  She,  a  striking 
Italian  blonde,  with  red  hair,  shared  the  favor  of  the 
public  with  Amadeo,  as  one  of  the  most  regal  of  all  this 
kingly  race,  both  for  manners  and  gracious  courage. 
And  we  who  were  lookers-on  would  drive  out  to  see 
the  prospective  bride  and  her  mother,  the  pious  Princess 
Clotilde,  going  to  meet  all  these  relatives. 

The  father,  "  Plon-Plon,"  Prince  Jerome  Bonaparte, 
and  his  sister,  the  Princess  Mathilde,  had  gone  down 


A   MAGNIFICENT   PROCESSION  305 

with  US  on  the  same  train  from  Aix-les-Bains,  so  we  felt 
in  a  remote  way  as  if  we  were  of  the  wedding-party. 

The  first  time  I  saw  Letitia  she  was  dressed  in  red, 
which  became  her  dark  beauty.  Her  likeness  to  the 
First  Consul  was  striking.  She  has  the  most  "Bona- 
parte" face  of  them  all.  She  was  driving  with  her 
mother  (the  Princess  Clotilde,  who  never  wears  anything 
but  black)  to  meet  the  King  and  Queen  of  Italy.  This 
was,  of  course,  the  most  important  arrival  of  all. 

The  Count  Gianotti,  to  whom  I  owed  the  pleasure  of 
being  in  Turin  at  all,  had  sent  me  cards  for  the  great 
ceremony  at  the  Palazzo  Madama ;  so  a  friend  of  mine 
and  I,  with  a  servant  to  attend  us,  drove  to  the  palace 
at  an  early  hour,  where,  standing  in  a  large  gallery,  we 
could  see  the  procession  go  by  to  a  private  chapel. 

It  was  a  handsome  function.  First  the  Archbishop 
of  Turin  and  his  attendant  clergy  in  all  the  glory  of 
Eoman  Catholic  dress;  then  the  Syndic  and  city  officials, 
each  very  brave  in  his  fine  clothes;  then  Gianotti  as 
prefect  of  the  palace,  strikingly  handsome.  Then  the 
Queen  Marguerite,  "  the  Pearl  of  Savoy,"  who  was  es- 
corted by  the  King  of  Portugal.  She  was  magnificent 
in  white  satin  covered  with  gold  embroidery,  flashing 
with  diamonds,  her  famous  pearls  dependent  to  her 
waist,  and  a  lace  cloak  hanging  over  her  train  from  her 
shoulders  —  a  lace  which  made  every  woman's  mouth 
water.  I  have  never  seen  a  human  being  so  splendidly 
dressed  or  looking  so  queenly  as  she  did  on  that  occa- 
sion. Then  followed  the  Queen  Maria  Pia,  all  in  blue, 
with  the  arms  of  Portugal  embroidered  on  her  blue 
velvet  train.  She  wore  a  net-work  crown  of  sapphires 
in  her  red  hair,  and  it  was  most  becoming.  King  Hum- 
bert had  her  on  his  arm. 

Then  came  the  bride,  with  the  jewels  of  Queen  Hor- 


806  AN   EPISTLE   TO   POSTERITY 

tense, which  had  been  given  her  by  the  Empress  Eugenie; 
she  wore  also  a  lace  veil,  the  present  of  Queen  Mar- 
guerite, which  swept  the  ground.  She  was  conducted 
by  her  father.  After  her  followed  the  melancholy, 
handsome  groom,  looking  for  once  radiantly  happy,  and 
conducting  his  sister  and  future  mother-in-law. 

Prince  Plon-Plon  (long  since  separated  from  his  wife) 
played  his  silent  part  well.  The  Princess  Mathilde  walked 
with  the  Prince  of  jN'aples,  and  then  came  a  long  line  of 
relatives  and  ladies  in  waiting,  all  in  magnificent  cos- 
tumes. I  saw  then  where  Titian  and  Tintoretto  and 
Paul  Yeronese  had  got  the  subjects  for  their  immortal 
pictures  and  ceilings ;  it  was  from  studying  such  cere- 
monials as  this.  It  seemed  impossible  that  our  nine- 
teenth century  could  have  produced  this  mediasval 
grandeur. 

I  caught  a  glimpse  of  the  group  in  the  chapel.  The 
Princess  Letitia  knelt  first  to  King  Humbert,  then  to 
Princess  Clotilde,  her  mother ;  then  to  her  father,  who 
conducted  her  to  the  altar.  The  long  ceremony  which 
followed  was  too  fatiguing  to  follow,  so  we  left,  to  see 
her  again  in  the  afternoon  as  she  received  the  congrat- 
ulations of  the  city,  on  a  high  estrade  of  flowers,  in  the 
Piazza  Yittorio  Emanuele. 

There  was  a  procession  of  all  the  gilded  youth  of 
Turin  and  ISTorthern  Italy,  headed  by  the  three  sons  of 
Amadeo,  dressed  in  the  costume  of  Prince  Eugene — a 
three-cornered  hat,  white  powdered  hair,  the  close-fitting 
embroidered  coat  and  full  skirts  of  the  military  uni- 
form of  that  period. 

Two  hundred  of  them  acted  as  escort  to  the  Queen — 
"Gardes  a  Peine,"  indeed,  out  of  Dumas  —  while  two 
hundred  others  escorted  the  bride,  and  two  hundred  re- 
mained to  take  care  of  the  happy  groom.     It  was  a 


MARQUIS   D'AZEGLIO  307 

royal  cortege.  And  then  we  sat  gazing  at  this  group 
of  kings  and  queens  who  were  seated  on  the  gigantic 
flower- basket  for  two  hours,  as  music  pla3^ed  and  can- 
nons were  fired.  Finally  the  beautiful  rose -covered 
balloon  (with  the  initials  of  the  royal  pair),  which  was 
fastened  over  the  floral  estrade,  was  allowed  to  rise 
serenely,  to  carry  the  news  to  the  stars,  and  carrier- 
pigeons  were  despatched  to  all  the  capitals  to  bear  the 
tidings  to  the  courts  of  Europe.  I  was  amused  at  this 
total  forge tfulness  of  the  fact  that  this  was  the  nine- 
teenth century  instead  of  the  fourteenth.  This  ignoring 
of  the  vulgar  modern  telegraph-wire  had  a  sublime 
mediaeval  insolence  in  it  which  added  the  last  rose-leaf. 

In  the  evening  we  went  to  the  opera  to  see  the  King 
and  Queen  receive  an  ovation. 

The  ball  at  the  palace  was  on  Thursday,  and  there 
again  we  saw  the  royal  pair  and  all  their  noble  rela- 
tives. I  had  a  little  talk  with  the  Marquis  d'Azeglio, 
the  man  who  was  so  long  minister  to  England,  who  had 
just  published  the  delightful  letters  of  his  mother,  a 
perfect  picture  of  the  times  through  which  she  had 
lived.  Her  more  distinguished  son,  Massimo  d'Azeglio, 
had  died  some  time  before.  This  polished  nobleman 
pointed  out  to  me  some  of  the  most  distinguished  beau- 
ties of  the  former  court  of  Victor  Emanuel,  and  gave 
me  many  interesting  anecdotes  of  these  children  of  the 
Re  Galantuomo.  ''  But,"  said  he,  "  this  marriage  is  the 
queerest  story  yet.  Amadeo  is  so  in  love  that  it  would 
have  killed  him  to  give  her  up."  He  took  me  to  the 
gallery  of  famous  armor  and  showed  me  some  histori- 
cal pieces.  But  although  the  marquis  was  a  fervent 
Italian,  he  preferred  to  talk  of  England,  where  he  had 
spent  twenty-two  years  of  his  life. 

The  Queen  was,  of  course,  the  object  of  his  most  fer- 


808  AN  EPISTLE   TO   POSTERITY 

vent  eulogies.  "  She  never  forgets,"  said  he ;  "  her  mem- 
ory is  fabulous,  and  her  tact  perfect." 

He  said  that  the  Princess  Clotilde  was  wholly  ab- 
sorbed in  rehgion,  and  that  she  and  the  Prince  Amadeo, 
or,  as  they  called  him,  the  Due  d'Aosta,  were  very  much 
in  sympathy.  He  told  me  that  the  marriage  of  the 
Princess  Letitia  had  been  a  great  anxiety  to  her,  as 
the  Bonapartes  were  not  favorites  in  Italy,  but  that  a 
marriage  with  Prince  Emanuel,  her  cousin,  had  been 
thought  of.  "Now  she  has  married  her  uncle,  his 
father,"  said  the  Marquis,  with  a  queer  contraction  of 
the  mouth. 

There  had  been  a  marriage  arranged  for  her  with 
Prince  Torlonia  of  Eome,  but  the  Pope  had  interposed 
his  veto,  and  that  match  was  broken  off. 

I  remember  seeing  her  on  horseback  in  a  scarlet  habit, 
coming  in  from  her  mother's  country-house,  on  her 
bridal  morning,  accompanied  by  that  same  band  of  cous- 
ins and  friends  who  were  later  on  to  become  "Gardes 
k  Keine." 

She  affects  scarlet ;  it  is  the  Bonaparte  livery.  Her 
uncle-husband  lived  scarcely  more  than  a  year,  com- 
mending her  lovingly  to  the  care  of  King  Humbert, 
who  has  nobly  discharged  his  trust.  The  brothers  loved 
each  other  very  fondly. 

The  Prince  of  J^aples  was,  of  course,  at  this  wedding, 
then  a  pretty  boy  of  seventeen.  He  looked  like  his 
mother,  and  his  German  blood,  inherited  from  his  grand- 
mother, who  was  a  sister  of  the  King  of  Saxony,  Albert 
Frederick,  spoke  in  his  light  hair  and  fair  skin.  He  had 
a  brow  of  remarkable  strength,  a  fine,  serious  counte- 
nance, and  his  mother's  grace  of  character.  He  is  now 
twenty-eight,  and  is  married.  The  only  defect  in  his 
appearance  is  that  he  is  rather  short. 


THE   QUIRINAL   SHOULD   REMEMBER    AIX  309 

I  cannot  leave  this  delightful  fete  without  referring 
again  to  the  quaint  brightness,  social  tact,  and  sweet- 
ness of  the  Queen.     She  is  a  subject  one  cannot  leave. 

"  She  had  a  hard  task  when  she  first  married,"  said 
the  Marquis  d'Azeglio.  "The  Italian  Court  had  been 
for  many  years  deprived  of  a  queen,  and  was  thoroughly 
disorganized.  The  Sardinian  king  resembled  his  great 
ancestor,  Henry  lY.  of  France,  too  much  in  his  private 
life  to  surround  his  widowed  throne  with  much  elegance 
or  dignity;  but  she  has  re-arranged  it  all,  and  she  has 
the  royal  gift  of  never  forgetting  a  face  or  a  name." 

It  is  wonderful  that  the  House  of  Savoy  is  not  more 
mindful  of  Aix,  for  there  it  had  its  origin.  The  Eoyal 
House  of  Prussia  remembers  well  its  humble  birth,  in 
the  eagle's  nest  at  Hohenzollern,  before-  the  Duchy  of 
Brandenburg  became  its  nursery  and  Berlin  its  parade- 
ground.  But  the  House  of  Savoy,  whose  dead  lie  buried 
in  yonder  Hautecombe  —  whose  ruined  tower,  covered 
with  ivy,  is  still  pointed  out — never  seems  to  allude  to 
its  origin,  except  in  the  name  ''  Marguerite  de  Savoie,^^ 
given  to  the  most  beautiful  and  beloved  queen  on  earth ; 
never  seems  to  remember  this  birthplace  of  its  valiant 
race !  Here  are  the  ruins  of  the  old  Chdteau  de  Char- 
bonniere,  which  was  the  beginning  of  the  Quirinal. 
Francis  I.  took  this  chateau  in  1556  and  razed  it  to  the 
ground.  Emanuele  Filiberto  repaired  and  restored  it 
in  1590.  Charles  Emanuel  became  its  owner  in  1600. 
Sully,  who  attacked  it,  met  with  a  formidable  resistance. 
Finally,  a  band  of  beautiful  women  emerged  from  that 
garrison,  and,  armed  with  the  most  potent  Aveapons, 
their  nails  and  their  smiles,  proved  more  dangerous 
than  many  cannon.  The  result  was,  of  course,  an  hon- 
orable capitulation,  and  the  men  got  the  worst  of  it,  as 
they  generally  do.  ^ 


810  AN   EPISTLE   TO   POSTERITY 

Back  in  Aix-les-Bains  again.  Let  me  quote  from  an 
old  letter : 

"  The  Queen  of  England  has  had  her  portrait  painted 
some  two  hundred  times,  and  has  been  photographed  as 
many  more,  I  dare  say,  but  never  did  she  exhibit  a  more 
characteristic  picture  than  j^esterday  as  she  walked  out 
of  the  humble  little  English  church  at  Aix-les-Bains, 
where  she  devoutly  worships.  A  short,  stout  figure,  a 
very  red  face  (the  characteristics  of  the  Georges),  light- 
blue  eyes,  a  long  upper  lip,  straight  bandeaux  of  gray 
hair,  dressed  in  deep  and  very  simple  mourning,  with 
the  portrait  of  Prince  Albert  at  her  breast,  the  most 
famous  woman  of  the  nineteenth  century,  the  Queen 
of  England,  Ireland,  and  Scotland  and  the  Empress  of 
India,  walked  to  her  gilded  chair  of  state  through  rows 
of  not  impertinent  starers,  and  took  her  seat,  with  the 
Princess  Beatrice  (a  very  pretty  girl)  on  one  side  and 
Lady  Churchill  on  the  other,  the  Marchioness  of  Ely 
and  Sir  Henry  Ponsonby  a  little  farther  on.  The  latter 
placed  a  cushion  before  the  Queen,  and  she  followed  the 
service,  '  devoutly  kneeling.' 

"  After  the  service  she  rose  first,  the  whole  congrega- 
tion standing  and  waiting,  and  she  passed  out,  grace- 
fully turning  to  the  right  and  left,  and  looking  rather 
than  bowing  her  acknowledgments.  Yery  short  and 
stout  as  she  is,  there  is  a  great  air  of  natural  dignity  and 
power  about  her,  and  a  natural  grace,  both  of  course 
improved  to  the  highest  point  by  courtly  breeding.  She 
and  the  Princess  entered  one  coroneted  carriage  and 
were  whirled  off  to  The  Europe,  her  hotel,  in  which  she 
takes  np  a  dependance  in  the  garden,  called  the  Yilla 
Mottet.  Her  ladies  followed  in  another  carriage  at  a 
respectful  distance.  The  Princess  Beatrice  is  a  tall, 
light-haired,  blonde  girl,  not  at  all  like  her  mother,  and 


AIX-LES-BAINS   AND   CHAMBERY  311 

has  been  thought  prettier  than  the  other  royal  daugh- 
ters. 

"  Koyalty  needs  repose.  It  is  a  hard,  fatiguing,  and 
worrying  business.  The  perpetual  cares  of  a  house- 
keeper are  intensified  in  the  life  of  a  queen.  For  in- 
stance, we  see  that  the  Empress  of  India  has  lately  had 
to  change  servants ;  some  old  and  competent  ones  have 
left,  dissatisfied  with  their  last  place,  and  she  has  had  to 
get  in  a  new  set ;  and,  what  is  worse,  to  try  to  make 
them  live  together  peaceably.  jN"©  New  England  house- 
keeper during  spring  cleaning,  when  the  cook  leaves, 
has  a  busier  week  than  poor  Queen  Victoria  has  all  the 
time.  She  takes  these  worries  hard,  too.  She  is  of 
*that  anxious  disposition';  she  is  no  longer  young; 
she  is  not  in  good  health.  No  wonder  that  her  faithful 
daughter,  Beatrice — the  best  daughter  that  ever  lived — 
was  anxious  to  take  her  overworked  mamma  off  for 
a  holiday  to  that  delicious  spot  where  heaven  meets 
earth,  or  earth  meets  heaven,  half  way.  The  Talmud 
tells  us  there  is  such  a  place ;  we  call  it  Aix-les-Bains. 

"  Three  years  ago  the  Princess  Beatrice  went  to  Aix. 
les-Bains  for  her  rheumatism,  and  was  delighted  with 
its  rare  beauty.  She  made  her  first  essay  in  authorship 
by  writing  an  account  of  this  famous  place  in  Good 
Words  for  January,  1883.  For  the  last  journey  that 
she  and  her  mother  were  to  take  together  before  her 
marriage  she  selected  Aix-les-Bains — the  fertile,  smiling 
spot,  with  its  snow  mountains  and  massive,  cragged, 
curious  peaks,  its  enchanting  Lake  of  Bourget.  There 
is  something  about  this  place  which  appeals  to  the  fancy, 
thrills  the  imagination,  and  touches  the  heart. 

''  I  thought,  as  I  approached  it  from  Turin,  coming 
up  from  Eome,  that  never  did  mountains  stand  off  so 
grandly.    Chambery  is  a  picturesque  old  town ;  it  Ues 


312  AN    EPISTLE    TO   POSTERITY 

on  its  green  velvet  cushion  of  grass  like  the  necklace  of 
a  queen ;  from  afar  I  could  see  the  old  chateau,  with  its 
flying  buttress,  dominating  the  curious  and  mediaeval 
town — and  from  that  lofty  old  tower  floated  the  stand- 
ard of  England. 

"  Soon  Ave  reached  a  view  of  the  valley  of  Aix,  domi- 
nated by  the  high  peak  of  the  ISfivolet,  on  whose  sum- 
mit glitters  a  grand  cross  of  silver.  How  sweet  and 
garden -like  it  looked,  this  dear  valley,  although  snow 
still  lingered  on  the  mountains  immediately  about  the 
town.  Everywhere  floated  the  cross  of  St.  George  and 
the  lion  of  England.  Soldiers  in  the  gaudy  uniform  of 
France  were  marching  through  the  streets,  and  at  the 
gates  of  the  Hotel  de  FEurope  stood  a  guard  of  honor. 
What  had  happened  to  the  peaceful  valley,  which  last 
summer  boasted  nothing  more  warlike  than  gay  Savoy- 
ard ladies  driving  their  pony  phaetons,  all  hung  with 
bells  and  gay  worsted  fringes,  or  picturesque  peasant 
women  with  their  bundles  on  their  heads  ?  Then  I  re- 
membered, as  a  gay  officer  all  dressed  in  Savoyard  uni- 
form passed  me,  that  Queen  Victoria  and  Princess 
Beatrice  were  at  Aix.  These  soldiers  in  gray  and  gold 
were  a  guard  of  honor  that  the  Queen  did  not  need. 
For  was  not  Mont  du  Chat  there,  grim  and  cold,  plung* 
ing  his  feet  in  Lake  Bourget  as  he  lifted  his  head  to  the 
sky,  in  which  he  found  a  blue  as  pellucid  as  that  in 
which  he  bathed  his  feet  ?  The  Ni volet,  too,  was  stand- 
ing sentinel  over  this  most  beautiful  valley.  And  these 
were  her  guards  of  honor ! 

"  I  had  not  supposed  anything  could  possibly  improve 
Aix,  it  was  so  pretty  before ;  but  banners  and  music  im- 
prove everything.  While  the  French  and  English  flags 
looked  gay  enough  against  the  bluest  of  skies,  the  sol- 
diers showed  up  well  against  the  stone  walls  of  the  old 


EOYALTY    SIGHTSEEING  313 

chateaux,  and  the  fresh  green  and  the  budding  trees  of 
this  lovely  primavera  were  perfect  in  their  beauty. 

"  The  next  day,  along  the  Lake  of  Bourget,  I  saw  a 
strange  figure,  a  man  on  horseback,  making  mysterious 
gestures  to  clear  the  way.  He  seemed  to  be  waving 
his  whip  convulsively  in  the  air,  as  if  he  were  bringing 
tidings  of  great  joy  or  of  terrible  trouble.  He  proved 
to  be  an  English  pad-groom,  and  he  preceded  a  plain 
chariot  in  which  sat  four  ladies.  My  driver  turned  to 
me,  and,  raising  his  hat  respectfully,  said,  'La  Reine'' ; 
he  drew  up  on  one  side  of  the  road  and  stopped,  while  her 
Majesty,  the  Princess  Beatrice,  and  two  ladies  drove  on. 

"And  after  that  it  was  an  every-day  occurrence  to  see 
the  royal  party  pass,  to  meet  them  in  our  walks,  to  see 
them  at  church,  and  to  hear  of  their  explorations  of  the 
delicate  lovely  lake  and  town  of  Annecy — that  pretty 
town  where  Time  stands  with  his  finger  on  his  lip,  say- 
ing, '  Kespect  some  of  my  best  work ' — or  to  hear  how 
they  had  been  up  to  Hautecombe,  or  to  Miery,  Mouxy, 
and  Clarafoud,  those  queer  little  stone  villages,  where 
the  peasants  have  lived  under  the  same  roof  with  their 
horses  and  cows,  their  goats  and  their  sheep,  for  four 
centuries.  There,  in  the  green  fields,  play  their  children 
in  long  gowns  and  little  black  caps,  dressed  just  as  they 
were  dressed  four  hundred  years  ago,  and  as  you  will 
see  them  costumed  in  Eembrandt's  pictures.  The  peas- 
ant women  wear  a  heart  and  cross  on  a  velvet  ribbon 
to-day,  just  as  their  grandmothers  did  hundreds  of  years 
ago.  One  day  the  Queen  and  the  Princess,  Lady  Ely, 
Lady  Churchill,  and  Sir  Henry  Ponsonby,  Dr.  Eeid  and 
two  other  doctors,  drove  up  to  St.  Innocent's  to  see  the 
rabbits.  These  innocent  little  pink-eyed  Angoras  had 
never  had  a  more  distinguished  call.  The  rabbits  are 
plucked  alive   (it^  does  not  hurt  them),  and  their  fur 


314  AN    EPISTLE   TO   POSTERITY 

makes  a  soft  yarn,  out  of  which  the  peasants  knit  little 
shawls,  tippets,  gloves,  wristlets,  knee-caps,  and  so  on. 
It  was  very  pretty  to  see  the  Princess  take  the  rabbits  in 
her  soft,  white  hands,  and  how  she  laughed  at  their  opal 
eyes  and  long,  fluffy  fur.  Some  of  these  funny  little 
animals  are  black,  others  white,  and  still  others  gray. 
Then  she  made  the  young  peasant  girl  in  the  Savoyard 
cap  and  apron  teach  her  to  spin  the  yarn  on  a  long 
spinning-wheel.  All  the  party  bought  some  specimens 
of  this  original  rabbit-work. 

"  But  perhaps  the  most  picturesque  of  the  royal  visits 
was  to  the  old  Abbaye  of  Hautecombe,  a  fine  old 
gloomy  monastery  on  the  farther  side  of  the  Lake  of 
Bourget,  built  so  as  to  exclude  every  ray  of  sun  from 
its  austere  cloisters,  excepting  for  one  hour  of  the  day. 
Here  dwell  the  white-robed  Cistercian  monks,  whose 
rule  is  only  less  severe  than  that  of  La  Trappe.  They 
guard  with  their  vigils  and  their  prayers  the  tombs  of 
the  princes  of  the  house  of  Savoy.  A  steamboat  had 
been  chartered  for  her  Majesty  and  suite,  and  the  hoary- 
headed  old  prior  came  out  to  meet  her  in  a  six-oared 
pinnace.  The  monks  were  all  in  their  white  woollen 
capuchins,  and  wore  ropes  and  crosses  at  the  waist. 
Among  them  was  one  monk  of  English  birth,  who  had 
not  seen  his  sovereign  for  thirty  years.  AVhat  a  beauti- 
ful picture  could  have  been  made  of  this  scene,  as  the 
red  flag  of  England  floated  from  the  steamboat,  and  the 
mountains  of  the  Dent  du  Chat,  the  grim  Kivard,  the 
distant  Jura  Alps,  the  grand  masses  which  rise  up 
towards  Chambery,  the  ever  snow-clad  Dauphinois  Alps 
to  the  far  south,  looked  down  on  this  exquisite  Lake  of 
Bourget,  with  its  mysterious  shadows  and  sheen,  its  pea- 
cock -  green  color !  ^  It  was  not  the  hand  of  man,  but 
the  hand  of  God,  that  played  with  these  masses,'  says 


315 

Lamartine,  describing  the  mountains  about  the  Lake  of 
Bourget.  The  Queen  advanced  to  the  front  of  the 
boat;  the  aged  prior  was  assisted  up  the  side  of  the 
steamer  and  made  a  low  reverence.  The  Queen,  with 
a  courtesy  that  did  her  honor,  bent  for  his  blessing.  The 
boats  proceeded  to  the  landing ;  then  the  monks,  chant- 
ing, walked  up  the  hill,  foUow^ed  bj  the  prior  carrying 
the  cross,  the  queen,  her  ladies,  and  attendants  following. 
And  Fancy  whispered,  '  "Was  it  Mary  Queen  of  Scots  at 
Holy  rood,  or  a  more  fortunate  Queen  V 

"  The  Queen,  who  speaks  French  like  a  native,  entirely 
without  an  accent,  as  does  the  Princess,  entered  the  con- 
vent, talking  to  the  prior,  and,  with  the  brothers,  she 
admired  the  view,  which  commands  the  whole  lake. 
Having  looked  at  the  tombs  of  the  princes  of  Savoy,  and 
having  inspected  the  collection  of  sculptures,  paintings, 
and  frescoes,  the  royal  visitors  partook  of  luncheon, 
which,  with  the  delicious  trout  of  the  lake,  the  cordial 
of  Chartreuse,  and  the  wines  of  the  happy  valley,  was 
by  no  means  an  ascetic  repast.  Probably  in  all  her 
varied  journeys  the  Queen  has  never  assisted  to  make  a 
prettier  picture,  nor  could  she  ever  have  seen  a  vision  of 
more  perfect  natural  loveliness. 

"  On  Tuesday,  the  14th  of  April,  the  Princess  Beatrice 
arrived  at  the  age  of  28.  She  struck  me  as  a  tall,  grace- 
ful, pretty  girl  with  an  American  look,  and  with  a 
'  nez  Watteau,'  as  the  French  say.  Tennyson  calls  it  *  a 
nose  tip-tilted  like  a  flower.'  She  has  very  fine  brown 
e3^es  and  fresh,  red  lips.  A  more  simple-mannered  girl 
than  this  Princess  I  never  saw.  The  whole  English 
colony  at  the  various  hotels  joined  in  presenting  her 
with  flowers  on  the  occasion  of  her  birthday,  and  she 
was  embarrassed  and  frightened  to  death ;  her  lips  and 
hands  trembled  as  she  tried  to  say,  *  I  thank  you.' 


816  AN   EPISTLE   TO   POSTERITY 

"  It  is  very  evident  that  the  Queen  of  England  and 
her  family  have  no  love  of  purple  and  fine  linen  when 
they  are  '  oif  duty.'  '  Our  royal  family  has  always  been 
dowdy,'  said  a  loyal  Englishwoman  at  Aix-les-Bains,  as 
she  returned  from  presenting  some  flowers  to  the  Prin- 
cess Beatrice  on  her  birthday. 

" '  Well,'  said  an  outsider,  '  what  did  the  Princess 
wear?  I  desire  to  know  what  clothes  princesses  wear 
when  they  are  at  home  in  the  morning.' 

"  '  An  old  checked  black-and-white  silk  dress,  which  I 
should  have  given  to  my  maid,'  answered  the  loyal 
Englishwoman;  'but  she  was  very  lovely  and  court- 
eous, and  blushed  and  stammered  and  was  frightened 
when  we  offered  her  the  flowers,  just  like  any  other 
girl.     I  could  not  help  loving  her  for  it.' 

"  In  the  evening  a  fete  had  been  arranged  in  her  honor, 
which  was  a  pretty  bit  of  illumination.  The  Yilla  Mot- 
tet,  which  was  the  dependance  of  the  Hotel  de  I'Europe, 
where  the  Queen  lived,  was  all  lighted  up  by  colored 
lanterns.  The  local  choral  unions  of  Chambery  and 
Aix  marched  about  singing,  '  God  save  the  Queen.' 
Fireworks  burst  from  every  wooded  nook  and  corner 
and  from  a  splendid  arch  which  bore  the  royal  arms  and 
the  order  of  George  and  the  Dragon.  In  colored  lights 
the  illuminated  '  Dieu  et  Mon  Droit,'  and  the  name  of 
'Beatrice'  shone  from  many  an  arch.  These  varied 
lights,  falling  on  the  mountains,  still  covered  with  snow, 
produced  a  startling  effect.  Twenty-eight  guns,  at  reg- 
ular intervals,  thundered  forth  their  hot-lipped  greeting. 

"  'And  Jura  answered  from  her  misty  shroud 

Back  to  the  answering  Alps,  who  called  to  her  aloud.' 

"  The  Princess  stood  on  a  balcon}'-  and  bowed  repeat- 
edly to  the  crowd. 


THE  FUNERAL  OF  THE   PEINCE   IMPERIAL  317 

"  It  has  been  said  that  this  Princess  has  known  sor- 
row; that  she  was  very  fond  of  the  Prince  Imperial, 
'  Eugene  Louis  Jean  Joseph,'  the  son  of  Eugenie  and  the 
Emperor  of  France,  who  was  killed  in  Zululand,  1st  of 
June,  1879.  It  is  certain  that  w^hen  thousands  gath- 
ered at  Camden  House  to  honor  the  funeral  of  that  poor 
boy  the  Queen  and  Princess  Beatrice  came  first;  the 
Queen  knelt,  and  prayed  at  the  foot  of  the  coffin,  and 
laid  on  it  a  wreath  of  gold  laurel  leaves,  tied  wath  a 
white  ribbon,  leaving  her  card,-  on  which  were  some 
words  written  in  French. 

"  The  Princess  Beatrice,  weeping  bitterly,  placed  an 
exquisite  wreath  of  porcelain  flowers  on  the  grave. 

"  *  I  wish  it  to  last  forever,'  she  said. 

"  The  Prince  of  Wales  and  his  lovely  wife  sent  a  wreath 
of  purple  violets  and  white  clematis,  with  these  words 
(in  the  handwriting  of  the  Prince) :  *  In  token  of  affec- 
tionate regard  for  the  Prince,  who  lived  the  most  spot- 
less of  lives,  and  died  a  soldier's  death,  fighting  for  our 
cause  in  Zululand.' 

"  Alas !  he  loved  Beatrice,  poor  boy !  It  may  be  that 
this  memory  has  chastened  the  heart  and  subdued  the 
manner  of  the  Princess  Beatrice,  for  her  face  has  a 
shade  of  melancholy,  and  her  smile  even  is  not  joyous. 

"  We  should  not,  however,  remember  these  things  on 
her  birthday,  particularly  as  Prince  Henry  of  Batten- 
berg  w^as  expected  to  arrive.  Perhaps  ^ve  all  hoped  to 
see  a  little  bit  of  a  Royal  courtship.  Whether  or  not 
Cupid  in  crown  and  sceptre  is  more  authoritative  than 
when  simply  armed  with  bow  and  arrow  has  never 
been  decided.  But  we  were  not  gratified  with  a  sight 
of  the  young  lover.  The  Prince  of  Wales  does  not  like 
this  suitor  of  his  Eoyal  sister,  it  is  said ;  but  the  Queen, 
with  hereditary  obstinacy,  has  decided  that  her  darling 


818  AN   EPISTLE   TO   POSTERITY 

shall  marry  the  man  of  her  choice.  A  very  wise 
Queen. 

"  The  next  expedition  of  the  Queen  and  Princess  was 
to  that  high  mountain,  the  Chambottes,  which  looks  over 
the  lake  and  the  surrounding  country.  The  last  stage 
of  the  journey  up  this  mountain  is  made  with  the  assist- 
ance of  a  donkey,  or  of  a  chaise  a porteurs^hj  those  who 
cannot  walk,  but  the  Princess  bounded  over  its  stony 
walk  like  a  chamois. 

"  She  was  so  delighted  with  the  view  and  the  primitive 
hotel  on  the  top  that  she  sent  to  the  keeper  of  the  house 
her  portrait  and  autograph.  The  delighted  Savoyard 
has  a  world  of  anecdote  to  tell  of  this  visit  of  the  gra- 
cious young  lady. 

"  On  a  fine  spring  day,  when  the  yellow  kingcups  cov- 
ered the  earth  like  Danae's  shower  of  gold,  and  the 
pretty  grape  hyacinths  looked  as  royal  as  a  queen's 
mantle,  Prince  Henry  of  Battenberg  arrived." 

This  was  written  in  1885;  since  then  Beatrice  has 
become  a  widow. 


CHAPTER  XVII 

Letters  from  Spain— Barcelona  and  Tarragona— Roman,  Carthaginian, 
and  Moorish  Antiquities — The  Land  of  Don  Quixote — Cordova 
and  its  Mosque— Granada  and  the  Alhambra— Fair  Seville— The 
Donkey  in  Spain.  *^ 

We  entered  Spain  by  the  flowery  road  of  Avignon 
and  Nismes  on  May  18, 1889.  Leaving  Paris  cold  and 
dreary  behind  us,  we  found  ourselves  in  the  Land  of 
Blossoms  at  Lyons.  This  long  detour  was  necessary  if 
we  bought  Cook's  tickets,  which,  being  a  saving  of  40 
per  cent.,  we  were  glad  to  do.  Besides,  it  is  in  this  cold, 
late  spring  by  far  the  most  agreeable  way  of  entering 
Spain.  I  remember  long  ago  talking  with  the  poet 
Bryant  about  Spain,  which  he  had  often  visited.  "  Avoid 
the  sea-coasts  and  Madrid  when  it  is  cold.  Go  to  Bar- 
celona, Tarragona,  and  Valencia  first,"  was  his  wise 
advice,  and  I  am  very  glad  to  have  followed  it,  for  we 
found  the  country  a  rapture  of  blossoms.  Avignon,  as  a 
stopping-place,  is  something  delightful,  not  only  for  the 
Koman  remains,  but  for  a  sort  of  aroma  of  past  and 
present,  as  if  the  ghosts  of  the  old  popes  were  blowing 
off  their  unused  incense  over  the  flower-laden  fields. 
Petrarch  and  Laura  still  haunt  these  gardens.  Rienzi, 
last  of  the  tribunes,  is  still  chained  by  the  leg  in  yonder 
monastery  tower.  Avignon  is  a  haunted  town,  but  it 
has  a  neat  and  quaint  hotel,  hke  the  Peacock  at  Mat- 
lock. We  passed  also  a  day  at  Nismes,  very  fine ;  then 
to  Perpignan,  and  so  on  to  Barcelona. 


820  AN   EPISTLE  TO   POSTERITY 

The  railroad  ride  from  Perpignan,  with  the  Mediterra- 
nean on  one  side,  the  snowy  Pyrenees  on  the  other,  is  ex- 
ceedingly enjoyable.  There  we  saw  fresh  the  wonderful 
crimson  clover,  in  color  like  a  Jacqueminot  rose.  Of  all 
nature's  carpets  this  is  the  most  beautiful.  Also  the 
yellow  lupine  and  the  white  spirasa,  most  elegant  of  wild 
flowers ;  and  a  blue  flower,  which  shall  remain  anony- 
mous because  I  do  not  know  what  it  was.  I  only  have 
the  important  information  to  give  you  that  it  was  most 
beautiful,  and  as  blue  as  heaven — 

"As  blue  as  if  the  sky  let  fall 
A  piece  of  its  cerulean  wall." 

Old  stone  ruins  began  to  crop  out,  and  we  were  aware 
that  the  Phoenicians  and  the  Romans  had  been  here  be- 
fore us.  The  blossoming  trees  coquetted  with  these  old 
stone  walls,  and  the  peaches  blushed  against  them,  as 
the  Iberian  maids  may  have  done  when  the  swarthy 
conquerors  made  love  to  them  w^ith  their  black  eyes. 
It  was  an  exquisite  day.  What  a  blessed  change  from 
cold,  bleak,  rainy  Paris,  which  was  never  so  disagree- 
able as  it  was  this  year !  To  go  south  in  the  spring  is 
to  anticipate  Paradise. 

Barcelona  surprised  us  with  its  air  of  prosperity,  move- 
ment, and  grandeur.  Splendid  seaport,  where  Ferdi- 
nand and  Isabella  came  to  greet  Columbus  on  his  return 
from  the  New  World.  He  stands  there  on  his  lofty 
pillar,  does  Columbus,  looking  over  the  sea  and  pointing 
to  New  York — the  fine  old  undismayed  creature,  one  of 
the  world's  heroes.  And  though  our  hearts  had  not 
swelled  to  the  proper  size,  as  though  the  lump  were  not 
big  enough  in  the  throat,  who  should  come  along  but  a 
party  of  Uncle  Sam's  sailors,  riding  in  an  omnibus  and 
carrying  a  flag  which  looked  very  familiar,  while  the 


BARCELONA  321 

strains  of  the  Stm-sjpangled  Banner  greeted  our  ears ! 
It  is  an  accident  which  may  happen  in  any  great  sea- 
port, but  it  was  uncommonly  apt  just  then.  Columbus 
was  being  serenaded  by  our  hearts,  our  eyes,  and  our 
bands.  The  grand  cathedral  was  of  course  our  first 
pilgrimage.  Here  I  saw  the  crucifix  which  Don  John 
of  Austria  carried  at  the  prow  of  his  ship  at  the  battle 
of  Lepanto.  The  image  is  violently  bent  over  to  one 
side,  as  if  to  avoid  the  bullets.  The  grand  Gothic  pillars 
of  immense  height,  the  stained  glass,  the  extent  of  this 
huge  Gothic  edifice,  prepare  us  for  greater  wonders  still 
farther  on.  It  was  first  a  pagan  temple,  then  a  mosque 
of  the  Moors,  but  became  a  Christian  temple  about 
1058,  which  seems  to  be  the  date  of  everything  in 
Spain. 

Barcelona  is  the  only  city  which  I  have  seen  with  the 
sidewalks  in  the  middle  of  the  streets — that  is  to  say, 
the  people  have  the  middle  of  the  street  for  a  broad 
promenade,  while  carriages  and  street -cars  run  at  the 
side.  No  one  can  imagine  how  much  prettier  and  more 
oonvenient  this  is.  The  Eambla,  with  its  double  row 
of  fine  trees  sheltering  this  broad  promenade,  is  one 
of  the  prettiest  sights  I  ever  saw.  This  is  the  great 
vein,  or,  rather,  artery,  of  the  city.  Down  its  broad 
course  runs  the  bluest  blood  of  the  city.  The  Parque 
Is  full  of  fine  trees  and  flowering  shrubs,  fountains,  and 
lakes.  I  noticed  a  richly  gilt  chariot  of  Victory  on  top 
of  an  arch.  General  Prim,  in  stone,  stands  at  the  en- 
trance. The  magnolias  overhang  an  imposing  cascade, 
and  an  avenue  of  palmetto  palms  leads  up  to  the  gate- 
way. A  wide  and  handsome  quay  at  the  foot  of  the 
statue  of  Columbus  darts  out  into  the  sea,  making  a 
lovely  promenade. 

We  drove  to  the  fort  of  Monprich,  a  fortress  of  con- 

21 


323  AN  EPISTLE   TO   POSTERITY 

siderable  strength,  which  was,  however,  surprised  and 
taken  by  Lord  Peterborough  in  1705. 

The  view  was  magnificent.  Not  only  the  fine  city, 
but  the  noble  harbor,  with  its  famous  memories,  lay 
at  our  feet.  Barcelona  is  said  to  rank  as  a  mercantile 
port  only  a  little  lower  than  Liverpool  and  Marseilles. 
Everywhere  in  the  churches  hangs  the  Saracen's  head  in 
stone,  as  if  just  cut  off.  This  tribute  to  a  defeated  foe 
shows  of  how  much  importance  he  was.  They  are  very 
interesting  as  bosses  and  corbels,  though  that  stare  of 
a  recently  beheaded  man  cannot  be  called  altogether 
pleasing.  I  think  if  I  had  been  taken  to  chu,rch  in  the 
cathedral  in  early  youth  I  should  have  been  frightened 
to  death  at  them.  The  capitals  in  cloister  and  cathedral 
are  well  worthy  of  study. 

We  left  Barcelona  with  regret,  to  take  a  delightful 
journey  to  Tarragona.  The  country  about  Barcelona 
is  extremely  beautiful,  and  we  bade  farewell  to  these 
blood-red  fields  of  clover,  which  reminded  us  of  Hanni- 
bal and  his  father,  Hamilcar  Barca,  who  killed  here 
three  thousand  people,  more  or  less.  During  the  Mid- 
dle Ages  Barcelona  was  the  lord  of  the  Mediterranean. 
Trade  has  never  been  held  to  be  a  degradation  by  the 
Catalans,  who  are  the  Yankees  of  Spain,  are  wide-awake, 
prosperous,  and  industrious — very  unlike  those  Spaniards 
farther  south. 

Tarragona  is,  for  Roman  remains  and  Gothic  archi- 
tecture, one  of  the  most  interesting  places  in  Spain.  We 
found  here  an  excellent  hotel  (the  Hotel  de  Paris),  not 
an  inevitable  thing  in  Spain  by  any  means.  Here  we 
went  to  see  the  cyclopean  walls,  enormous  stones  laid 
together  by  giants.  Nobody  knows  w^hat  sort  of  human 
arms  could  have  lifted  these  rocks.  The  Tarragonese 
claim  Pontius  Pilate  as  a  townsman,  and  fondly  show 


TARRAGONA  323 

his  birthplace.  They  may  have  him,  if  they  wish,  and 
keep  him  too. 

The  Cyclopean  walls,  ruin  upon  ruin,  are  intensely  in- 
teresting—  Carthaginian,  Moorish,  Koman.  They  tell 
the  story  of  three  or  four  races,  perhaps  half  a  dozen. 
I  pleased  myself  by  believing  that  some  captive  giant 
negroes,  hungry  and  despairing,  hfted  these  first  stones 
into  place.  They  look  as  if  they  might  be  the  first  bur- 
den the  white  man  laid  on  those  long-suffering  shoulders. 
The  drive  about  Tarragona,  looking  over  these  Roman 
towers  to  the  Mediterranean,  is  superb.  The  cathedral, 
of  a  rich,  yellow,  sienna -looking  marble,  is  one  of  the 
most  interesting  in  Spain ;  and  its  cloisters,  with  their 
priestly  garden  full  of  flowers  and  trees,  are  a  museum 
of  antiquity  and  a  spot  of  unearthly  perfection  and 
beauty.  The  rounded  arched  double  doorway,  the  cap- 
itals marvellously  sculptured,  the  elegance  of  these 
Moorish  arches  and  delicate  shafts  of  marble,  make  a 
walk  around  this  sweet  spot  an  enchanting  pleasure.  I 
have  seen  no  such  cloisters  elsewhere.  Those  in  Rome 
of  St.  Paul's  without  the  Walls  come  nearer  to  this  de- 
lightful, this  fabulous  wealth  of  tracery  and  intricate 
carving  than  any  other. 

Here  we  met  the  Tarragonese  people — mothers  with 
picturesque  babies,  looking  like  little  Murillos ;  beggars 
in  the  proverbial  cloak  ;  young  gallants,  and  pretty  girls 
with  handkerchiefs  around  their  heads.  The  black 
Spanish  eye,  in  all  its  phenomenal  loveliness  and  sad- 
ness, is  seen  here.  The  women  all  look  sad.  Perhaps 
it  is  only  a  variety  of  beauty,  however. 

We  drove  to  the  public  square  to  hear  some  fine 
music.  The  soldiers  were  all  out,  and,  as  the  band 
struck  up  a  gay  waltz,  a  few  sefiors  and  senoritas 
danced  off,  in  a  most  Fanny  Elssler  manner,  with  a  wild 


324  AN   EPISTLE   TO   POSTERITY 

grace  which  was  enchanting.  Many  of  the  women 
wear  the  mantilla.  They  are  all  picturesque,  from  the 
shepherd  in  the  fields,  who  wears  his  striped  plaid  as  if  he 
were  standing  for  his  picture,  to  the  lady  on  her  balcony. 

It  being  Sunday  and  a  feast-day,  we  saw  the  famous 
old  tapestries  for  which  the  cathedral  at  Tarragona  is 
celebrated.  These  are  chiefl}^  Flemish,  and  are  said  to 
have  belonged  before  the  Reformation  to  St.  Paul's, 
London.  How  they  got  here  nobody  knows.  An  Eng- 
lishman offered  the  bishop  twenty  thousand  guineas 
for  them,  an  offer  indignantly  refused. 

Euins  of  the  Roman  aqueduct,  the  ever-wonderful 
arches,  the  towers,  all  remain  to  testify  to  this  city  of 
the  Scipios.  It  is  a  citadel  surrounded  by  vineyards. 
These  old  Romans  loved  the  wine  which  rivalled  the 
Falernian,  and  which  still  goes  up  to  France  to  redden 
and  enrich  the  clarets  and  Burgundies.  Augustus  raised 
this  city  to  be  the  capital  after  his  Cantabrian  cam- 
paigns, and  from  this  place,  26  e.g.,  he  issued  his  decree 
closing  the  Temple  of  Janus  forever.  It  was  an  imperial 
town.  Conveniently  situated  for  communication  with 
Rome,  this  stronghold  was  the  winter  residence  of  the 
prsetor.  We  can  imagine  the  gay,  hardy  Romans  sail- 
ing across  the  Mediterranean  to  this  their  winter  city. 
But  it  was  taken  by  the  Goths ;  the  Moors  later  made 
of  it  a  heap  of  ruins,  and  these  ruins  remained  undis- 
turbed for  four  centuries.  Now  to  the  antiquarian  it  is 
a  sort  of  Pompeii.  The  wine  business  makes  it  a  pros- 
perous town.  Its  harbor  is  full  of  coasting  vessels.  The 
wine  is  like  sherry,  to  my  taste  not  agreeable.  The 
lighter  vintages  are  sent  to  Bordeaux  to  fortify  the 
claret,  while  the  full-bodied  varieties  known  as  "  Span- 
ish reds  "  are  shipped  to  England  and  America  under 
the  name  of  port. 


THE   LAND   OF   DON   QUIXOTE  335 

Our  ride  to  Yalencia  was  a  long  one.  For  some  dis- 
tance out  of  Tarragona  the  scenery  is  dull,  stony,  and 
most  uninteresting:.  The  Mediterranean  seemed  inno- 
cent  of  a  single  sail,  though  always  blue  and  beautiful. 
Here  and  there  at  a  fishing  village  the  scene  was  pretty, 
as  the  fishermen  carry  the  nets  on  their  heads  in  a  pe- 
culiar manner ;  but  we  began  to  believe  that  Spain  could 
be  the  dry,  arid,  blasted  heath  which  we  had  been  pre- 
pared to  think  it  before  we  saw  Barcelona  and  Tarra- 
gona. 

But  as  the  afternoon  wore  on  we  came  "  into  a  land 
where  it  was  always  afternoon  "  ;  every  breeze  brought 
us  the  delightful  perfume  of  orange-blossoms  —  groves 
upon  groves  and  acre  upon  acre  of  orange-trees  in  full 
bloom,  palm-trees,  and  flowers  mingled  with  the  white 
locust,  which  fell  in  clusters  on  the  road.  JS'ow  we 
knew  we  had  reached  the  carefully  irrigated  fields  of 
the  Moors  as  we  saw  the  trickling  streams  of  w^ater 
percolating  through  the  meadows.  Spain  began  to 
smile  again,  and  to  respond  with  fruit  and  flowers  to 
the  care  and  wisdom  of  her  banished  children,  those  in- 
telligent Moors. 

We  reached  Yalencia  at  nine  o'clock,  fatigued.  Worn 
out  with  the  creeping  Spanish  railway  and  the  crowd  of 
beggars  about  the  station,  we  were  glad  to  get  to  our 
hotel.  The  famous  city  of  the  Cid  has  an  air  of  solid 
nobility.  Its  arched  colonnades,  narrow  streets,  fine 
plaza,  open  arcades,  are  thoroughly  Spanish. 

We  took  the  night  train  from  Valencia  to  Cordova, 
and  were  twenty-two  hours  in  penetrating  from  the 
coast  to  the  interior,  passing  through  the  very  land  of 
Don  Quixote.  I  got  up  at  five  o'clock  to  look  out  on 
the  dreary  plains  of  La  Mancha,  where  Cervantes  places 
Don  Quixote.     It  is  not  in  great  cities  that  romantic 


336  AN   EPISTLE   TO    POSTERITY 

visionaries  dream  dreams.  It  is  in  these  melancholy 
wastes  that  Quixotes  are  possible. 

As  I  stated  in  a  letter  written  at  Seville,  Spain,  and 
dated  May  18, 1889,  the  Mosque  of  Cordova  is  one  of  the 
most  beautiful  temples  which  exist,  one  of  the  most  ad- 
mirable monuments  of  man's  genius  on  the  earth.  We 
endeavored  to  take  a  drive  around  Cordova,  but  the  roads 
have  not  been  paved  since  the  time  of  the 'Moor,  so  it  was 
necessarily  short.  The  once  powerful  city  has  dwindled 
to  a  dead-and-alive  town  of  fifty  thousand  people,  who 
still,  however,  have  that  air  of  decayed  gentility  which 
all  Spanish  cities  keep.  Their  houses  are  pretty  Moorish 
buildings  amidst  most  lovely  gardens.  We  went  to  see 
the  old  bridge  dating  from  the  times  of  Augustus,  recon- 
structed by  the  Arabs,  and  the  ruined  old  walls,  the 
debris  of  statues  and  bas-reliefs,  the  inscriptions  in  honor 
of  the  emperors,  the  gray  old  vestibules,  the  fairy-like 
balconies  over  which  the  handsome  Andalusians  leaned 
with  flowers  in  their  beautiful  hair.  It  was  all  a  dream, 
and  Tom  Moore,  with  his  foolish  ballads  of  the  Guadal- 
quivir (the  river  flowing  at  our  feet),  came  up  with  the 
eternal  rhyme  and  the  twanging  of  the  guitar.  Such 
are  the  confusions  in  one's  archaeology  for  which  Cor- 
dova is  responsible. 

We  came  on  to  Granada  the  next  afternoon.  It  is 
appropriate  that  the  Mosque  of  Cordova  and  the  mira- 
cle of  the  Alhambra,  though  twenty-four  hours  from 
everywhere  else,  should  be  within  five  hours  of  each 
other.  The  sensuous  dream  of  luxury  on  earth,  which 
the  followers  of  the  Prophet  were  to  continue  in  heaven, 
could  have  no  grander  exploitation  than  the  Alhambra. 

We  had  a  delightful  journey.  The  Avild  flowers  and 
the  orange-groves  kept  us  company,  and  the  old  Span- 
ish towns  grew  more  quaint  and  old,  the  stones  grayer, 


THE  BEAUTIES   OF  THE   ALHAMBEA  327 

and  the  Sierra  Nevada  began  to  show  us  the  snow  :  an 
outline  not  unlike  Mont  Blanc  from  Geneva  rose  on  the 
rosy  horizon.  It  became  a  vision  of  unearthly  grandeur 
and  beauty.  When  the  evening  fell,  a  moon,  not  yet 
quite  full,  helped  to  prolong  the  picture. 

As  we  entered  Granada  the  beggars  and  cab-drivers,  the 
cries  of  the  Spanish  gypsies,  and  the  groans  of  the  donkeys 
nearly  deafened  us.  Soon,  however,  we  were  driving 
by  moonlight  through  the  beautiful  elm  forest  planted 
by  the  Duke  of  Wellington  in  1812,  and  the  nightin- 
gales were  bursting  their  throats  to  give  us  the  most 
delicate  poultice  for  our  wounded  ears.  You  remember 
Doctor  Holmes  says : 

"  And  silence  like  a  poultice  came 
To  Leal  the  wounds  of  sound." 

It  is  profanation  to  compare  the  exquisite  and  heart- 
breaking notes  of  the  nightingale  to  a  poultice,  but  it 
was  infinitely  soothing.  This  forest  was  a  surprise  to 
me.  Why  did  nobody  ever  tell  me  that  we  had  to 
drive  through  a  forest  to  the  Alhambra  ?  y 

We  alighted  at  the  Washington  Irving  Hotel,  where 
one  can  breakfast  on  a  balcony  overlooking  a  garden, 
where  from  one  window  we  looked  into  the  forest,  and 
from  another  over  a  bank  of  yellow  roses  towards  the 
Sierra  Nevada.  We  never  wished  to  go  away.  The 
Alhambra,  approached  through  magnificent  horseshoe 
arches,  and  opening  its  wonderful  fountains,  gardens, 
and  fairy-like  columns  upon  one,  is  at  first  a  disappoint- 
ment, because  it  is  in  the  process  of  being  restored,  and 
there  is  an  air  of  newness  about  the  Court  of  the  Lions 
which  dislocates  one's  dreams. 

But  to  go  often,  to  go  alone,  to  read,  think,  meditate 
there,  to  mount  its  towers,  to  dream  in  its  courts,  to 


828  AN  EPISTLE   TO  POSTERITY 

read  over  2hles  of  the  Alhamhra  there — it  grows  and  it 
grows,  until  it  becomes  the  palace  of  the  heart. 

The  superb  Hall  of  the  Ambassadors,  where  Ferdi- 
nand and  Isabella  received  Columbus,  was  the  first 
majesty  which  overwhelmed  me ;  then  the  Court  of 
the  Lions.  What  a  labyrinth  of  arches,  carved  embroi- 
deries !  what  indefinable  elegance !  what  inimitable  deli- 
cacy !  what  a  prodigious  richness !  Something  so  airy, 
so  undulating,  a  curtain  of  lace,  which  a  breath  could 
blow  away,  but  which  has  stood  seven  hundred  years ; 
a  delightful  confusion,  a  graceful  disorder,  the  majesty 
of  a  royal  palace  and  the  gayety  of  a  kiosk,  an  extrav- 
agance, a  delight,  a  living  grace,  a  folly,  a  fancy,  the 
dream  of  an  angel,  the  rosy  visions  of  first  love,  some- 
thing too  evanescent  to  describe — such  is  the  effect  of 
the  Alhambra. 

The  long  Arabic  inscriptions  on  the  walls  are  most 
graceful.  I  had  a  book  which  pretended  to  translate 
them,  and  a  copy  of  the  Koran  sold  at  Granada,  but 
I  could  not  make  them  out,  and  feel  as  Artemus  Ward 
did  about  Chaucer.  "  Mr.  C,"  said  he — "  Mr.  C.  was  a 
smart  man,  a  man  of  talent,  but  he  w^as  the  poorest 
speller  I  ever  met." 

Somebody  was  a  poor  speller — either  my  book,  or  the 
Koran,  or  the  sculptor.  I  cannot  read  Arabic  yet,  m ore's 
the  pity.  But  why  regret  anything  but  the  shortness 
of  life  and  the  flight  of  time  when  looking  at  these 
floating  ribbons,  these  flowery  niches,  arabesques,  stars, 
the  delicate  infinity  of  the  ever  -  recurring  polygonal 
and  checkered  kaleidoscope  patterns,  the  stalactites  and 
pendulous  graces  of  the  ceilings,  the  dewdrops  in  stone 
ready  to  fall,  the  stucco  lace  embroidered  with  a  thou- 
sand flowers?  The  fairy -like  columns  advance  and  dis- 
appear.    Looking  upward  one  sees  the  replica  of  the 


THE   HOME   OF  MYSTERY  AND   ENCHANTMENT  329 

court  below  in  a  palace  high  in  air.  From  behind  those 
grated  windows  the  dark-eyed  houris  looked  and  sighed, 
perhaps,  for  freedom. 

We  mouDted  a  high  tower  to  the  dressing-room  of 
the  Sultana.  From  this  immense  height  the  unhappy 
mother  of  Boabdil  let  down  her  little  boy  in  a  scarf, 
tying  all  her  shawls  together,  to  save  him  from  the 
revengeful  hate  of  her  rival.  The  room  is  still  rich 
with  a  subtile  perfume.  Farther  on  we  see  a  gloomy 
perspective ;  it  is  where  a  mad  woman  was  incarcerated. 

They  say  if  you  whisper  in  the  ear  of  one  of  the  lions 
one  can  hear  what  you  say  from  the  mouth  of  another ! 
What  an  oral  love-letter  might  thus  be  spoken!  The 
Alhambra  is  the  home  of  mystery  and  enchantment, 
and  his  lion  guards  only  ruin. 

"An  old  gray  lion,  yet  not  the  less 
A  lion  in  his  feebleness  1 

One  thing  is  left  him  still  to  guard. 
He  guards  it  well,  by  day  or  night. 
With  these  great  paws  of  granite  gray ; 

In  the  strong  shelter  of  his  breast, 
No  man  shall  serve  him  yet  with  scorn,  -^ 

Though  an  old  lion,  thus  forlorn. 

For  what  he  guards  is  Beauty's  rest," 

After  the  Salle  of  the  Abencerrages  we  went  to  see 
the  baths.  These  beautiful  rooms  were  restored  with 
taste  during  Charles  Y.'s  reign,  and  still  bear  their 
sumptuous  testimony  to  the  wise  luxury  and  cleanli- 
ness of  the  Moor,  a  virtue  in  which  he  has  not  been 
followed  by  the  Spaniard.  We  came  out  in  the  lovely 
Court  of  Myrtles,  and  looked  in  the  tranquil  cistern  full 
of  gold-fishes.  We  went  in  to  write  our  names  in  the 
visitors'  book. 

The  custodian  showed  us  first  Washington  Irving  and 


830  AN   EPISTLE   TO   POSTERITY 

then  General  Grant  and  family;  then  General  Sherman 
and  Colonel  Fred  Grant ;  then  the  name  of  Albert  Ed- 
ward and  his  faithful  friend  and  tutor  General  Bruce ; 
then,  later  on,  the  evil -fated  autograph  of  the  poor 
Prince  Eudolph  of  Austria,  that  of  the  Countess  of 
Pierrefond  (the  Empress  Eugenie),  of  the  late  King  of 
Spain  and  of  his  Koyal  sisters,  and  many  others  of  lesser 
degree. 

I  suppose  I  am  not  the  first  chronicler  to  say  that 
Seville  is  a  most  charming  city.  It  beams  on  one  who 
comes  from  the  rural  districts  of  Spain  as  Paris  beams 
on  the  early  American  before  he  becomes  satiated  with 
foreign  travel.  Although  it  has  nothing  to  compare 
with  the  Alhambra  or  the  Mosque  of  Cordova,  Seville 
still  has  its  antiquities,  Koman  remains,  and  Moorish 
palaces ;  its  grandest  of  cathedrals,  the  beautiful  mod- 
ern palace  of  the  Duke  de  Montpensier  (now  a  gray- 
haired  old  veteran  and  a  thorough  Spaniard),  the  beau- 
tiful Giralda  Tower — enough  to  come  to  Spain  to  see— 
and  the  Alcazar,  now  the  only  home  and  Spanish  palace 
of  Queen  Isabella.  It  is  full  of  family  portraits,  and 
with  its  fountains,  gardens,  and  restored  Moorish  rooms 
is  no  bad  copy  of  the  Alhambra,  but  still  a  copy  and 
not  the  original. 

We  started  off  well  for  modern  ideas  by  hearing  our 
countrywoman,  Emma  Nevada,  sing  in  El  Barlero  de 
Semlla  at  the  Opera-house.  The  pretty  little  woman, 
with  her  flute-like  voice,  is  a  tremendous  favorite  here. 
They  recalled  her  sixteen  times,  and  poured  out  flowers 
upon  her  until  she  could  not  walk  across  the  stage.  She 
had  been  singing  two  months  at  Madrid,  where  she  made 
an  essential  furore ;  had  an  audience  with  the  Queen ; 
and  is  a  great  friend  of  Count  Murphy,  who  has  given 
her  an  open  sesame  to  all  the  places  here  not  usually 


THE   LIBEARY   OF  CHRISTOPHER   COLUMBUS  331 

shown  to  visitors.  I  owe  much  to  her  friendship  in 
opening  them  to  me. 

But  it  was  a  great  pleasure  to  see  the  "  Barber "  on 
his  native  soil.  Around  me  sat  the  flower  of  Andalusian 
beauty  and  grace,  the  nobility  of  Seville.  Every  wom- 
an's hair  was  dressed  with  flowers,  and  the  famous  great 
carnations,  as  large  as  the  double  poppy,  were  in  every 
hand.  This  superb  flower  will  not  grow  so  large 
anywhere  as  here.  A  caballero  sent  me  a  bouquet  in 
which  I  counted  sixteen  varieties: 

We  have  had  some  very  amusing  encounters  with 
these  Sevillians.  I  brought  several  letters,  and  it  is  an 
awful  moment  when  a  haughty  Don  arrives  to  make  a 
call.  We  can  none  of  us  speak  Spanish,  and  they  speak 
no  French ;  so  the  courier  has  to  be  invoked,  and  the 
high  and  mighty  compliments  w^iich  follow  on  both 
sides  are  exchanged  through  his  mediation.  The  Don 
offers  up  his  house,  his  opera-box,  all  that  is  his.  We 
accept  nothing  but  a  "  permission  to  call,"  and,  perhaps, 
"  would  he  open  some  doors." 

I  owe  to  such  a  visit  from  a  distinguished  scholar  per- 
mission to  see  the  library  of  Christopher  Columbus,  now 
closed.  One  thing  they  do  not  do,  they  do  not  ask  you 
to  dinner.  No  one  gets  very  often  inside  their  houses. 
Sir  Clare  Ford,  at  Madrid,  says  he  asks  them  to  dinner, 
but  they  never  ask  him.  They  send  you  a  carriage, 
they  are  polite,  but  inside  their  houses,  no ! 

I  trust  that  at  Madrid  Ave  may  have  the  entree  to 
some  of  these  Spanish  interiors  so  jealously  guarded. 
The  hotel  at  Seville  (Hotel  de  Paris)  is  excellent.  The 
weather  is  just  now  very  hot,  but  w^e  easily  fall  into 
their  habits  of  the  siesta  at  one  o'clock.  AYe  rise  early 
and  see  the  sights,  return  home  and  have  breakfast,  and 
dine  late.    We  are  never  tired  of  these  pretty  houses 


AN   EPISTLE   TO   POSTERITY 


built  round  a  garden  at  which  we  get  peeps  through  the 
iron  lattice-work.  The  shops  are  dark,  cool  caverns 
filled  with  most  tempting  laces,  fans,  and  Spanish  wools. 
There  is  also  a  beautiful  pottery  here.  The  windows 
are  shutterless,  protected  by  iron  gratings  and  an  awn- 
ing. We  are  here  at  the  best  of  seasons,  the  spring, 
and  we  enjoy  a  full  moon  by  which  we  dine  late,  hear- 
ing the  mandolin  and  guitar.  A  moonlit  night  in  Se- 
ville is  a  love-song  all  by  itself.  These  open,  square 
courtyards  called  patios  are  surrounded  by  corridors, 
supported  by  marble  pillars,  with  a  fountain  playing 
in  the  middle.  They  are  covered  in  midday  by  an  awn- 
ing, called  toldo,  and  constitute  the  drawing-room  of  the 
family.  I  know  of  nothing  so  pretty.  To  go  back  to  an- 
tiquity, Abdul  Yakub  was  the  greatest  builder  of  his 
age,  and  in  1171  he  threw  a  bridge  of  boats  across  the 
Guadalquivir ;  he  repaired  the  Roman  Aqueduct  and 
raised  the  great  mosque  (now  the  cathedral,  and  under- 
going repairs).  To  him  we  owe  the  beautiful  Giralda 
Tower,  very  suggestive  of  the  Campanile  at  Florence. 
This  is  the  great  tower  where  in  Moorish  times  the 
muezzin  called  the  faithful  to  prayers.  ISTow  certain 
famous  bells  perform  his  office.  They  are  so  powerful 
that  even  the  devil  is  afraid  of  them,  and  Murillo  was 
fond  of  painting  the  scene  where  the  devil  and  his 
winds  were  dispersed  by  the  bells.  "Would  that  we 
had  an  agency  so  effectual  to  dispel  a  blizzard  or  a 
cyclone ! 

It  would  be  a  week's  work  to  describe  the  cathedral, 
its  wealth  of  beauty,  its  superb  size,  its  endless  arches. 
It  is  the  largest  thing  in  the  world  apparently.  I  did 
not  see  it  to  advantage,  and  therefore  have  not  so  pleas- 
ing a  remembrance  of  it  as  of  its  rivals  at  Barcelona  or 
Tarragona.   It  cannot  compare  with  the  Mosque  of  Cor- 


I 


333 

dova ;  but  it  has  two  beautiful  Murillos  in  it  which  I 
can  praise — "  The  Guardian  Angel "  and  the  "  Saint  An- 
thony of  Padua."  This  saint  has  been  to  New  York,  it 
will  be  remembered.  He  was  cut  out  b}^  one  of  his  own 
priests,  sent  to  Mr.  Schaus,  who  detected  whence  and 
where  he  belonged,  and  sent  him  back.  The  restoration 
is  skilfully  done,  and  it  is  an  unrivalled  specimen  of  the 
master. 

I  preferred  to  go  and  rest  in  the  lovely  Cinquecento 
gardens  of  the  Alcazar,  where  the  beautiful  Maria  de 
Padilla  bathed  the  forehead  and  soothed  the  savage 
temper  of  Pedro  the  Cruel  until  she  was  accused  of 
magic.  In  this  palace  of  the  Alcazar  Charles  Y.  was 
married,  and  at  his  order  arose  these  labyrinths  of  box 
in  the  style  of  the  Italian  renaissance,  these  orange- 
groves,  this  thicket  of  roses. 

I  have  often  asked  myself  how  I  should  feel  if  I  were 
to  be  in  the  home  of  Murillo  and  Yelasquez.  Here  I 
am  on  the  very  spot,  and  I  see  whence  they  drew  their 
inspiration.  Murillo  had  but  to  look  around  him  to  be- 
hold the  splendid  black-e3^ed  babies  and  the  beautiful 
Andalusian  Madonnas.  Neither  look  as  if  they  knew 
anything.  For  of  beggar  boys  the  supply  is  limitless. 
The  beggars  and  the  donkeys  in  Spain ! 

I  am  inclined  to  write  a  book  and  call  it  The  Donhey 
in  Spain.  Nothing  but  the  fear  that  some  wit  would 
ask  me  if  it  were  intended  for  an  autobiography  has 
deterred  me.  But  that  patient  little  beast  does  all  the 
work.  He  is  buried  under  two  panniers,  and  he  is  laden 
down  with  everything.  No  refuge  has  he  but  his  patient 
cry  and  his  discordant  note.  The  voice  of  protest  in  all 
the  world  has  been  discordant.  It  finishes  off  with  the 
donkey.  In  this  miserably  poor,  enormously  rich  coun- 
try he  seems  to  be  the  emblem  of  what  has  ruined  Spain 


334  AN   EPISTLE   TO   POSTERITY 

—-  oppression  and  taxation  ;  this  country  which  has  been 
ruined  by  bad  government,  but  is  so  beautiful  and  strange. 

I  enjoyed  very  much  the  Palace  of  St.  Telmo,  the 
beautiful  house  of  the  Due  de  Montpensier.  Here  I 
saw  two  of  the  best  of  Yelasquez — portraits  of  Philip 
lY.  and  of  Olivarez ;  also  some  poor  Murillos,  and  the 
original  of  Ary  Scheffer's  ''  St.  Monica  and  St.  Augus- 
tine" ;  splendid  examples  of  Zubaran  and  other  Spanish 
painters ;  also  a  curious  series  of  pictures  from  Don  Quix- 
ote^ embroidered  in  silk  by  a  man,  very  original,  humor- 
ous, and  quaint.  The  Duke  must  be  a  student  of  Cer- 
vantes, for  he  has  statuettes  of  the  Don  and  of  Sancho 
Panza  everywhere.  Sancho  was  a  famous  name  among 
the  old  kings,  so  Sancho  Panza  is  equivalent  to  our  say- 
ing "Washington  Briggs."  The  house  is  full  of  records 
of  the  Orleans  family,  including  a  very  fine  full-length 
of  Philippe  Egalite,  the  Duke's  infamous  grandfather. 
The  Queen  Isabella  II.,  his  sister-in-law,  is  also  por- 
trayed, but  we  saw  no  likeness  of  his  dear  little  daughter 
Mercedes,  Queen  of  Spain,  whose  death,  they  say,  broke 
his  heart. 

Across  the  Paseo  de  Cristina  we  came  to  the  old 
Moorish  tower  of  the  Tomo  del  Oro.  No  one  knows 
whether  this  was  a  lighthouse  or  a  treasure-house,  per- 
haps both,  as  its  octagon  shape  and  high  lantern  would 
make  it  useful  in  either  capacity.  Pedro  the  Cruel,  the 
Henry  YIII.  of  Spain,  used  it  for  a  prison  in  which  he 
punished  his  false  wives. 

This  is  the  home  of  the  bull-fights,  but,  alas  for  us ! 
there  will  be  none  until  we  reach  Madrid.  So  our  cruel 
instincts  must  wait  a  week.  For  us  the  Plaza  de  Toros 
of  Seville  is  a  lost  delight.  Its  capacity  to  seat  twelve 
thousand  spectators,  its  view  of  the  Giralda — all  is  lost 
for  us.    The  effect  is  said  to  be  very  grand  as  the  last 


335 

bull  dies !  (I  do  not  know  that  I  am  inconsolable ;  one 
must  miss  something  in  any  country!  I  rather  hope 
there  will  be  no  bull-fights  in  Madrid,  if  it  be  not  trea- 
son to  say  so.) 

To  one  who  comes  here  to  welcome  poetical  impres- 
sions and  day-dreams,  Seville  is  the  most  satisfactory 
town  in  Spain.  It  is  still  the  city  of  the  most  pictu- 
resque blackguards  in  Spain,  Avho  sleep  on  the  steps, 
wear  their  shawls  and  cloaks  with  a  grace  which  is 
proverbial  —  pictures  of  the  bli^s  of  idleness ;  a  great 
argument  in  favor  of  being  entirely  worthless.  They 
have  no  vulgar  prejudices  as  to  duty  and  honesty,  but 
are  very  good  guitar  -  players.  No  grave,  solemn,  sad 
Spanish  type  is  this,  but  a  mixture  of  the  gypsy,  the 
bull-fighter,  and  the  contrabandist.  None  of  your  jeal- 
ous, haughty,  suspicious,  and  dignified  cavaliers  among 
these  beggars.  It  is  the  city  of  pleasure.  The  "  Bar- 
ber" is  its  true  expletive.  Eossini's  march  exactly  ex- 
presses it.  The  upper  classes,  however,  are  distinguished- 
looking  and  very  handsome,  the  men  especially — a  high 
type  of  Spaniard,  well  dressed,  riding  well-groomed  horses. 
The  turnouts  at  the  fashionable  drive  are  worth}^  of  Rot- 
ten Row.  The  women  wear  the  beautiful  mantilla.  In 
many  cases  it  is  becoming,  and,  being  local,  should  always 
supplant  Paris  bonnets. 

But  it  is  not  to  the  upper  class  (as  much  at  home  in 
Paris  as  in  Seville)  that  one  looks  for  the  true  Spanish 
type.  At  the  tobacco  factory,  in  the  streets,  we  have 
seen  some  fine  specimens  of  Andalusian  beauty.  The 
deep,  large,  full  black  eye,  the  raven  hair  in  such  mag- 
nificent profusion,  that  indescribable  charm  and  natural- 
ness, grace,  liveliness,  and  repartee  which  painters,  poets, 
and  opera-writers  have  sought  to  reproduce,  are  to  be 
seen  on  every  corner.     Byron  made  Cadiz  to  rhyme 


836  AN   EPISTLE   TO    POSTERITY 

with  ladies.    He  and  Tom  Moore  both  found  some  en- 
chantress here,  no  doubt. 

'No  wonder  the  Moslem  loved  to  linger  by  the  Guadal- 
quivir, to  dream  away  his  life  amid  the  enchantments  of 
refined  taste,  with  all  of  JSTature's  profuse  and  prodigal 
gifts  of  climate  and  production.  He  lavished  his  gold 
and  genius  to  adorn  his  city.  He  gave  freely  of  his 
blood  to  defend  it. 

"Fair  is  proud  Seville  !    Let  her  country  boast 
Her  strength,  her  wealth,  her  site  of  ancient  days." 

Later  on  Seville  became  the  court  of  Spanish  kings, 
and  is  linked  with  their  romantic  and  most  cruel  records. 
The  discovery  of  America,  by  making  it  the  emporium 
of  the  world,  revived  its  former  prosperity.  From  its 
port  of  Palos  sailed  Columbus,  Pizarro,  and  Cortez.  In 
the  fifteenth  century  it  was  the  home  of  the  merchant 
princes.  It  was  the  New  York  of  Spain.  It  became 
the  prey  of  the  French  in  1808.  Marshal  Soult  carried 
off  the  Murillos — in  fact,  tore  it  in  pieces.  The  English 
entered  it  in  1813  amid  universal  acclamations. 

The  Spanish  proverb  says  :  He  who  has  seen  Seville 
has  seen  wonders;  but  he  who  has  not  seen  Granada 
has  seen  nothing." 

It  is  difficult  now  to  know  why  they  so  adored  Gra- 
nada. Beautiful  as  is  the  Alhambra,  splendid  as  is  the 
view  of  the  Sierra  Nevada,  it  is  not  as  attractive  as  is 
this  flower-fringed,  cheerful  city.  The  lightness,  the 
elegance,  the  vivacit}'-,  the  show,  the  thousand  things  to 
see  here,  make  it  the  prettiest  and  most  peaceful  picture 
we  have  yet  seen.  To-day  is  the  Queen's  birthday,  and 
the  houses  are  all  decked  with  her  picture. 

She  is  the  Madonna  of  the  day,  the  ever-present,  ever- 
worshipped  Murillo,  the  immortal  type  of  the  most  per- 


THE    GREAT  KING   BABY  337 

feet  love.  A  mother  and  her  baby  rule  Spain ;  and  the 
baby  hand  holds  the  sceptre  with  an  invincible  strength. 
One  of  the  editors  of  the  Figaro  gave  me  a  letter  to  a 
high  official,  so  that  in  Madrid  I  should  see  the  Queen. 

'*  Yes,"  said  he,  "  but  I  know  you,  being  a  woman, 
want  to  see  the  baby." 

I  acknowledged  that  the  Majesty  of  "  two  years  and  a 
half  "  was  to  me  more  interesting  than  any  other,  and 
that  I  was  willing  to  put  my  neck  under  his  darling 
foot.  That  sovereignty  fresh  fuom  heaven,  the  great 
rule  of  King  Baby,  who  does  not  kiss  his  chubby  hand  ? 
He  rules  the  court,  the  politician,  and  the  Liberal. 

"  I  cannot  war  against  a  woman  and  a  baby,"  said 
Castelar. 

That  baby  is  now  a  fine  lad  of  ten  years  or  more.  He 
was  always  brave  and  kingly.  Falling  down  and  hurting 
himself  at  three  years  of  age,  his  governess  said,  "  Why 
does  not  your  Majesty  cry  ?" 

"  Oh,"  said  he,  scornfully, "  kings  never  cry." 

I  hope  he  may  go  out  of  life,  at  a  good  old  age,  with- 
out wanting  to  cry. 


CHAPTER  XVIII 

Letters  from  Spain  to  Friends  at  Home  —  Further  Thoughts  of 
Madrid  —  At  the  Bull -fight — Toledo,  the  Majestic  Crown  of 
Spain — The  Cathedral  and  Its  Memories — Moorish  Houses  and 
Toledo  Blades— The  Escorial— The  Library— The  Pantheon- 
Burgos  and  Farewell  to  Spain. 

Madrid,  May  23,  1889. 

I  CANNOT  quit  the  very  delightful  subject  of  Seville 
without  mentioning  the  visit  which  I  paid  to  the  library 
of  Columbus.  I  am  ashamed  to  say  that  what  was 
denied  to  Edward  Everett  Hale,  as  I  read  in  his  lovely 
book,  Seven  Spanish  Cities,  was  granted  to  me — that 
is,  a  view  of  the  original  letters  of  Columbus,  his  map 
drawn  with  his  own  hand,  and  wet  with  sea- water  and 
perhaps  with  his  tears ;  also  the  priceless  manuscripts 
of  the  library  bought  by  Fernando  Columbus  and  given 
by  him  to  the  city  of  Seville. 

It  is  only  another  proof  that  the  battle  is  not  to  the 
strong  or  the  race  to  the  swift.  That  the  great  Boston 
scholar  should  have  been  denied  this  privilege,  he  the 
nephew  of  Edward  and  Alexander  Everett,  who  enabled 
Washington  Irving  to  write  the  Life  of  Columb^cs ; 
he  who  has  a  proprietary  right  to  these  manuscripts — 
that  he  should  not  have  seen  them,  and  that  I  should,  is 
one  of  those  wrongs  which  are  irretrievable.  I  had  the 
open  sesame  of  a  letter  of  introduction  with  a  noble- 
man's name.  Let  no  one  travel  in  Spain  without  this 
golden  key.  The  same  golden  key  took  me  to  the  upper 
rooms  of  the  Alcazar  and  to  the  Duke  de  Montpensier's 


CIGAR  ROLLERS   AT   SEVILLE  339 

palace,  a  most  delightful  place.  But  it  takes  no  golden 
key  to  open  the  tobacco  factory.  The  delightful  voice 
of  Emma  Nevada  did  that  for  me.  We  arrived  at  the 
factory  and  were  refused  admittance.  "  Tell  them  Mme. 
Nevada  has  no  other  chance,"  said  her  husband,  "as 
she  has  been  singing  Seville  off  its  feet  in  the  BarberP 
That  immediately  brought  down  the  governor,  and'  we 
were  shown  that  immense  industry — six  thousand  women 
rolling  cigarettes  and  cigars.  These  poor  things,  often 
under  fourteen,  are,  some  of  them,  accompanied  by  a  baby 
and  a  cradle. 

One  pretty  young  creature,  not  more  than  fifteen, 
had  a  baby  as  beautiful  as  any  of  Murillo's,  and  she  was 
so  proud  of  him  that  she  had  made  for  him  a  pillow  of 
the  splendid  carnations  of  which  Spain  is  so  proud.  No 
Koyal  duke  ever  had  a  more  imperial  one.  This  poor 
child  of  sin  and  shame  is  cared  for  as  if  born  in  the  pur- 
ple. The  excellent  governor  told  me  that  by  allowing 
these  girls  to  bring  their  children  they  hoped  to  prevent 
matricide.  The  mothers  earn  a  franc  and  a  half  a  day. 
There  is  also  a  creche  where  these  mothers  who  wish  to 
get  rid  of  their  children  can  drop  them  in  a  revolving 
basket  and  lose  sight  of  them  forever.  I  went  to  see 
those  dear  sisters,  whose  motto  is,  "These  children  of 
sin  are  sinless ;  we  will  make  them  good  Christians  for 
the  Lord — good  soldiers  for  the  King,"  and  I  have  never 
seen  an  infant  asylum  cleaner  or  more  attractive. 

Indeed,  on  this  vexed  question  I  consider  Seville  vast- 
ly ahead  of  America. 

"We  came  through  to  Madrid  by  night.  It  is  an  unin- 
teresting journey  by  day,  I  hear.  We  arrived  at  Ma- 
drid in  the  morning,  to  be  disappointed  in  its  general 
architecture.  It  is  not  a  Spanish  city  in  the  least.  Its 
chief  attractions  are  the  Bueno  Eetiro,  a  beautiful  park. 


840  AN   EPISTLE   TO   POSTERITY 

These  recollections  of  Spain,  written  on  the  spot  to 
friends  at  home,  necessarily  grew  confused  and  repe- 
titious. 

Another  beautiful  drive.  El  Prado,  ending  in  the 
Paseo  Castellano,  is  ornamented  with  a  beautiful  statue 
of  Isabella  the  Catholic.  Ferdinand  holds  her  bridle 
rein  as  she  sits  on  horseback — the  old  Cardinal  Ximenes 
stands  by  her  side.     It  is  a  pretty  modern  statue. 

Along  the  Paseo  Castellano  are  the  fine  palaces  and 
gardens  of  the  grandees  of  Spain.  This  promenade  was 
founded  by  Espartero,  the  favorite  minister  of  Queen 
Isabella.  It  is  the  patrician  street  of  Madrid.  We 
drove  also  around  the  palace  and  the  square  of  the 
Opera,  where  is  the  famous  statue  of  Philip  lY.,  the 
whole  resting  on  the  horse's  hind-legs.  The  tradition 
is  that  Galileo  told  them  to  weight  the  tail  of  the  horse 
with  lead,  and  that  keeps  the  horse  eternally  rearing. 
It  is  very  wonderful  in  its  way. 

The  Eoyal  Palace  at  Madrid  is  certainly  a  magnifi- 
cent Koyal  residence,  both  without  and  within — espe- 
cially within.  Its  marbles  and  gildings,  its  rooms  in 
every  style,  especially  the  throne  room,  which  has 
chandeliers  of  rock  crystal  and  colossal  looking-glasses, 
are  very  fine.  Then  there  are  marbles  galore,  crim- 
son hangings,  coats  of  arms,  and  ceilings  painted  in 
illustration  of  the  virtues  of  kings  and  the  virtues  of 
subjects,  where  the  costumes  of  the  people  are  repre- 
sented. Then  comes  a  splendid  gdbinete  fitted  up  with 
china.  This  was  all  made  by  the  artists  whom  Charles 
II.  brought  with  him  from  E'aples  from  the  manu- 
factory of  Capo  di  Monte.  The  large  winged  figures 
offer  the  most  splendid  examples  of  this  now  lost  art 
that  at  present  exist  in  the  world. 

The  view  from  the  palace  windows  is  splendid  but 


THE   GREAT    PICTURE-GALLERY  341 

dreary.  lS[o  tasteful  Moor  has  irrigated  the  land  or 
planted  trees,  flowers,  and  fountains.  There  is  no  gush 
of  running  water,  as  at  the  Alhambra.  The  Manzanares, 
a  most  uninteresting  stream,  runs  through  the  arid  land- 
scape, and  the  mountains  are  harsh  and  ugly. 

We  have  seen  the  Queen,  who,  with  her  two  little 
daughters  and  her  Royal  son,  inhabits  this  most  regal 
house  and  lights  it  up  with  love  and  maternity.  She 
is,  indeed,  a  charming,  unpretending,  and  most  gracious 
Royal  lady. 

The  great  gallery  is  a  reason  in  itself  for  coming  to 
Madrid.  The  Yelasquezes  and  Murillos  have  been  so 
often  described  that  there  is  nothing  for  me  to  say  ex- 
cept that  they  are  peerless. 

This  is  considered  one  of  the  richest  galleries  in  the 
world,  and  is  presided  over  by  Don  Pedro  Madrazo,  the 
famous  father  of  a  now  famous  son,  the  portrait-painter 
in  Paris.  This  learned  man  has  published  a  catalogue, 
in  two  volumes,  which  is  a  history  of  painting  in  it- 
self. It  contains  the  history  of  the  painters  and  their 
works.  This  museum  is  a  really  fine  building  on  the 
Paseo  del  Prado.  Within,  the  arrangements  are  most 
admirable. 

'No  collection  of  pictures  was  ever  made  under  great- 
er advantages.  Charles  Y.  and  Philip  II.  were  true  con- 
noisseurs, and  happened  to  be  in  power  during  the  bright 
period  of  the  Renaissance,  when  "  art  w^as  a  necessity." 
Then  Philip  lY.,  a  most  true  lover  of  art,  ruled  in  Naples 
and  the  Low  Countries  while  the  second  glorious  pe- 
riod of  art  was  at  its  highest.  He  collected  pictures 
and  honored  artists.  All  these  kings  were  devoted 
friends  of  the  artists,  invited  them  to  their  tables  and 
decorated  them.  Yelasquez  and  Rubens  were  guests 
at  the  palace.    The  viceroys  of  Spain  collected  the  gems 


842  AN   EPISTLE    TO    POSTERITY 

from  the  Low  Countries  and  from  Italy,  and  the  finest 
specimens  of  Eaphael,  Titian,  Tintoretto,  Yandyke,  Paul 
Yeronese,  Rubens,  and  Teniers  may  be  seen  here.  Imag- 
ine a  gallery  in  which  there  are  sixty-two  examples  of 
Yelasquez.  It  is  only  here  that  the  masterpieces  of  this 
master  can  be  studied  and  understood.  There  are  forty- 
six  of  Murillo's  greatest  masterpieces. 

One  is  swamped  in  such  a  gallery.  The  only  way  is 
to  give  a  week  to  it ;  do  it  patiently,  go  often,  come 
away  when  too  tired  to  look  further,  and  then  to  jump 
out  of  the  window  and  commit  suicide,  having  not  half 
seen  it. 

We  are  amused  at  some  of  our  countrywomen,  who 
walk  around  for  half  an  hour,  and,  swinging  their  para- 
sols at  a  picture,  say,  "  That's  pretty  "  ;  "  Now  I  have 
seen  it  all" ;  "Let's  go  home  to  breakfast";  "  I  don't  like 
this  gallery  half  as  well  as  the  one  in  Russia  "  ;  "  There, 
I  declare,  I  don't  want  to  see  any  more"  ;  and  so  on. 

The  art  collection  founded  by  Charles  Y.  is  said  to  be 
the  finest  in  the  world.  The  titanic  blade  of  Gonsalvo 
Hernandez  de  Cordova,  Isabella's  "  Gran  Capitan "  ;  a 
magnificeht  sword  of  Philip  II. ;  the  sword  of  Charles 
Y.,  made  by  John  of  Toledo;  the  Florentine  armor 
of  the  great  Duke  of  Alva;  the  helmet  and  shield  of 
Francis  I.,  found  after  the  battle  of  Pa  via ;  gold  votive 
crowns ;  real  crowns  and  shields ;  whole  suits  of  armor, 
including  one  worn  by  Isabella  the  Catholic,  down  to 
one  worn  by  the  latest  man  who  wore  armor — all  are 
preserved  here  most  carefully.  It  is  a  splendid  day's 
work  to  see  this  treasure-house  of  history,  and  these 
really  beautiful  and  valuable  things  are  in  themselves 
most  wonderful. 

These  king-collectors  of  Spain  were  consummate  art 
critics.     They  have  never  been  surpassed. 


THE   BULL-FIGHT  343 

The  Church  of  San  Francisco  el  Grande  is,  perhaps, 
the  most  worthy  of  a  visit  as  a  curious  and  beautiful 
church.  But  Madrid  is  too  modern  for  churches.  It  is 
a  sad  contrast  to  Granada,  the  Alhambra,  to  the  Mosque 
of  Cordova,  Seville  and  its  cathedral.  Indeed,  it  has  no 
claims  peculiarly  Spanish.  It  is,  however,  gay,  metro- 
politan, and  full  of  handsome  shops.  It  is  the  capital 
city,  and  that  is  always  worth  seeing. 

We  leave,  however,  for  the  greater  glories  of  Toledo 
and  of  the  Escorial,  and  shall  then  quit  Spain  after  five 
weeks  of  enjoyment  of  its  glories  and  its  local  coloring. 

The  weather  has  become  very  hot;  the  only  cool 
places  are  inside  these  great  marble  buildings  or  within 
the  English  embassy,  where  Sir  Clare  Ford  entertained 
us  at  lunch.  We  are  on  the  Puerta  del  Sol,  the  centre 
of  the  town,  from  which  all  the  streets  radiate,  and  we 
are  every  evening  amused  by  the  most  vivacious  crowd, 
who  shout,  laugh,  and  sing  late  into  the  night.  Some- 
times we  see  a  gay  group  of  soldiers,  whose  martial 
music  enlivens  the  morning  air.  These  soldiers  wear  the 
regular  Roman  sandal,  and  it  looks  strange  enough 
with  their  black  and  red  coats  and  sometimes  their 
German  helmets.  However,  they  are  good  soldiers  and 
fight  well. 

No  one  has  seen  Spain  who  has  not  witnessed  a  bull- 
fight. It  is  the  successor  to  the  Olympic  games  of 
Greece,  or  the  more  cruel  gladiatorial  contests  in  the 
Coliseum  when  human  beings  fought  with  wild  animals ; 
so  when  the  placards  announced  a  magnificent  "  Festa 
de  Toros  "  I  sent  my  courier  to  the  Puerta  d' Alcala  to 
buy  tickets.  As  we  drove  to  the  Plaza  de  los  Toros 
all  Madrid  seemed  going  with  us,  anxiety  and  impa- 
tience depicted  on  their  countenances.  Business,  pleas- 
ure, and  religion  were  forgotten.    It  was  Sunday  after- 


844  AN   EPISTLE  TO   POSTERITY 

noon,  and  prince  and  peasant,  gay  lady,  young  girls, 
children,  master  and  servant,  were  all  directed  towards 
the  spot  in  which  centres  the  Spaniard's  chief  delight. 
Vehicles,  horses  and  mules,  all  with  gay  trappings,  an- 
nounced a  national  holiday. 

We  were  soon  inside  the  immense  circus,  over  three 
hundred  feet  in  diameter,  surrounded  by  a  strong  bar- 
rier paling  six  feet  in  height.  Behind  one  enclosure 
bulls  were  bellowing  ominously.  Our  seats  were  in  a  box 
near  that  of  the  Governor  and  the  Eoyal  box,  which  was 
empty,  but  gorgeously  adorned  with  velvet  hangings 
and  the  Koyal  lion  of  Spain.  The  boxes  of  the  court  and 
the  ambassadors  were  roofed  in  and  gayly  ornamented 
with  silk  and  gold  embroideries,  filled  with  beautiful 
women,  many  with  the  white  mantilla,  and  accompanied 
by  cavaliers  in  gay  uniforms ;  also  dignified  priests  in  sac- 
erdotal habits.  It  was  a  magnificent  sight.  Soon  one  of 
tlie  four  great  barred  gates  was  thrown  open  and  a  splen- 
did procession  entered.  Men  on  horseback  carrying 
spears  were  preceded  by  two  standard-bearers  on  mules ; 
heralds  announcing  by  flourish  of  trumpets  the  pica- 
dors, stacadores,  banderilleros,  and  matadors.  These  last, 
gorgeously  dressed,  were  loudly  cheered ;  and  they  de- 
served it,  for  they  were  the  handsomest  creatures  I  had 
ever  seen. 

After  this  really  splendid  procession  had  passed  twice, 
the  matadors  walked  alone  to  the  Governor's  box,  say- 
ing something  equivalent  to 

"We  who  are  about  to  die  salute  thee." 

Then  the  herald  demanded  the  key  which  should  release 
the  bull. 

An  instant  clearing  of  the  vast  arena,  and  a  solemn 
silence   followed,  and   only  the   great  matador  Fras- 


THE   INJUSTICE   OF  THE   BULL-FIGHT  345 

cuelo,  the  champion,  stood  alone,  waving  his  scarlet 
shawl. 

Then  the  door  was  unlocked  and  the  bull  rushed  out. 
Although  he  seemed  a  wild  image  of  strength,  I  de- 
clare I  pitied  him,  he  looked  so  surprised  at  that  un- 
wonted spectacle.  The  almost  childish  expression  in 
those  unawakened  eyes,  that  had  but  just  now  looked 
on  Andalusian  meadows,  was  most  pathetic.  But  soon  his 
calmness  gave  way  to  fury ;  he  spurned  the  ground  with 
his  hoofs,  threw  the  dust  in  the  air  with  his  horns,  and 
the  sound  of  the  trumpet  and  the  entrance  of  a  crowd 
of  stacadores,  waving  their  sliawls  at  him,  roused  his  in- 
discriminate rage,  and  he  tore  to  shreds  the  shawls  they 
left  behind  them  in  their  flight. 

Then  Frascuelo  with  genuine  courage  approached 
him  and  planted  an  arrow  in  his  neck.  The  fury  of 
the  tortured  animal  became  intense. 

The  picadors  now  entered  with  horses.  Poor  beasts ! 
we  had  to  see  them  gored — a  horrible  and  bloody  sight. 
The  valor  of  the  wounded  horses  now  excited  the  plau- 
dits of  the  multitude;  they  seemed  to  enter  into  the 
spirit  of  the  scene.  With  lighted  arrows  burning  in  his 
back,  the  poor  bull  rushed  upon  a  stacador,  who  threw 
his  shawl  over  his  head,  and  with  agility  and  skill  gave 
him  another  arrow. 

After  a  terrible  scene  of  cruel  injustice  and  unfair 
play,  in  which  forty  or  fifty  tormentors  exasperated  his 
fury,  and  six  horses  were  killed,  the  scene  was  left  to 
the  bull  and  Frascuelo,  who  now  stood  with  a  green 
shawl  thrown  over  his  arm,  a  perfect  picture  of  slender 
beauty  and  grace.  The  bull  had  been  wildly  foaming 
with  rage  and  suffering,  but  now  he  became  stationarv, 
and  glared  silentl}^  at  the  brilliant  figure  of  his  daring 
antagonist.    I  declare  this  was  exciting,  as  the  matador 


346  AN   EPISTLE   TO   POSTERITY 

met  that  fiery  glance  with  the  steady  and  determined 
gaze  of  undaunted  intrepidity. 

Several  minutes  seemed  to  be  passed  in  this  suspense. 
"When  the  matador  advanced  and  waved  his  green  man- 
tle, the  bull  jumped,  to  be  repulsed  by  his  sword. 
This  contest  went  on  silently  for  several  minutes.  The 
paralysis  of  death  was  on  the  poor  animal ;  he  staggered, 
and  the  trumpets  sounded  just  before  he  fell.  Frascuelo 
tempted  him  to  one  more  leap,  and  then  planted  his 
dagger  between  the  horns,  the  head,  and  neck.  The 
bull  looked  at  him  with  reproachful  eyes,  staggered,  and 
fell  on  the  earth,  which  was  red  with  his  blood. 

I  was  so  sick  and  faint,  so  overcome  at  the  brutality 
of  this  fiendish  sport,  that  I  hardly  heard  the  shouts  of 
"  Bravo !  bravo !"  and  the  fanfaronade  of  trumpets.  As 
through  a  mist,  I  saw  women  throw  flowers  and  rings  and 
chaplets  at  Frascuelo,  and  he  was  carried  off  a  hero.  I 
saw  them  chain  the  horns  of  the  dead  bull,  together  with 
the  wounded  horses,  and  drag  them  off.  Four  mules 
abreast,  gayly  caparisoned,  made  it  a  sort  of  procession. 
I  do  not  know  which  astonished  me  most,  the  strikingly 
curious,  brilliant  coup  cVceil,  the  dexterity  of  the  men, 
the  intrepidity  of  the  animals,  the  miserable  unfair  play, 
or  the  pleasure  of  the  spectators. 

"  Madame  will  stay  to  see  the  next  bull  killed — a  beau- 
tiful creature  ?"  asked  my  courier,  who  had  enjoyed  it, 
immensely. 

"  [N'o,"  said  I,  "  get  us  out  of  this  as  soon  as  possible." 

We  three  women  were  faint  and  dizzy,  and  we  all 
saw  blood  wherever  we  looked  for  the  rest  of  the  day. 

The  matadors  are  the  heroes  of  Spain.    They  go  from 

city  to  city  followed  by  a  troop  of  admirers.     They 

grow  very  rich.     Their  portraits  are  everywhere  and  I 

•       brought  home  a  tambourine  with  Frascuelo's  handsome 


THE    STEEETS    OF   TOLEDO  347 

face  on  it.  They  are  splendidly  dressed  in  that  costume 
with  which  the  opera  of  Carmen  has  made  us  familiar. 
Of  perfect  athletic  figure,  although  small  men,  they 
present  the  superiority  of  human  reason  over  brute  force. 
But  how  cruel,  inhuman,  and  degrading  is  the  spectacle 
of  such  misplaced  courage !  "  Butchered  to  make  a 
Eoman  holiday,"  I  thought,  as  I  looked  at  the  bull. 

Toledo,  Spain,  June  1,  1889. 

Toledo  is  the  most  picturesque'  place  in  Spain,  and 
has  the  worst  hotels  and  the  steepest  of  streets.  We 
were  precipitated  down  a  mountain  torrent,  or  the  dry 
bed  of  one,  in  a  curious  mixture  of  omnibus,  jaunting- 
car,  and  furniture  van,  around  which  hung  calico  cur- 
tains, ragged  as  the  *'hair  of  Hecuba,"  the  same  being 
drawn  by  a  mule  and  a  horse,  tied  in  with  ropes  and 
"  exhorted "  by  a  Spaniard  with  a  long  whip  and  a 
voluminous  vocabulary.  My  friend,  who  has  more 
nerve  than  I  have,  had  looked  out  of  the  furniture  van, 
and  had  said,  resignedly,  "  One  man  is  holding  the  pole 
of  the  carriage,  two  more  are  holding  the  mule  and  the 
horse.     We  cannot  escape  immediate  destruction." 

I  closed  my  eyes  and  said  a  prayer,  awaiting  instant 
death,  when  we  stopped  all  right  in  a  sort  of  triangular 
square,  if  there  is  such  a  figure  in  geometry,  and  found 
that  this  was  an  every-day  drive  in  this  town  of  memo- 
ries. Instead  of  a  triangular  square,  perhaps  I  should 
call  this  little  place  "  Puerta."  It  is  about  as  large  as 
half  a  pocket-handkerchief,  and  would  have  been  square 
only  an  impertinent  house  came  walking  down  into  it 
and  spoiled  its  shape.  This  house  we  called  the  home 
of  Juliet,  it  was  so  pretty  and  made  Eomeo  so  practi- 
cable. There  was  the  window,  and  the  balcony,  and 
some  cooing  doves  in  a  box  on  the  iron  balustrade.    It 


848  AN   EPISTLE   TO   POSTERITY 

is  all  out  of  the  scenery  of  a  theatre— Toledo.  When  I 
was  introduced  to  my  apartment  (if  a  cell  in  the  wall, 
with  a  hole  to  admit  the  air,  can  be  so  dignified)  I 
leaned  out  of  my  window  (?)  and  reached  my  parasol 
across  to  Juliet's  window  and  the  cooing  doves.  It  just 
made  a  convenient  bridge  for  a  dove  or  a  love-letter. 

Presently  we  were  summoned  to  supper  and  sent 
over  brick  floors,  which  were  laid  by  the  Visigoths,  up 
a  strange  staircase  of  brick  and  lath  to  a  room  with 
Moorish  tiles,  where  we  had  some  very  good  omelet 
and  some  potted  pigeons,  perhaps  some  of  the  doves. 
Our  courier  made  us  some  excellent  tea.  After  ascend- 
ing, or  descending  (which  was  it  ?),  to  our  bedrooms 
again  we  uttered  a  feeble  cry  for  hot  water.  We  were 
told  the  fire  was  out !  Yet  the  poor,  dear  little  birdlike 
sisters  made  up  their  fire  again,  and  we  each  had  a  hot 
bath  brought  in  beautiful  old  Moorish  tubs,  which  were 
so  handsome  that,  but  for  their  size,  and  what  in  New 
England  would  be  called  their  heft,  we  should  have 
tried  to  bring  them  back  with  us  to  ISTew  York.  The 
beds  were  perfectly  clean,  and  ^ve  soon  slept  the  sleep 
of  the  weary.  In  the  morning  the  sociable  grosbeaks, 
as  we  called  the  birdlike  sisters,  brought  us  some  more 
hot  water,  and,  what  was  rarer,  some  cold  water,  and 
we  got  a  good  breakfast — more  doves  and  more  omelets 
— and  went  out  to  see  the  town  in  the  same  jaunting-car, 
with  the  mule  and  the  horse  and  minus  the  crazy  "  hair 
of  Hecuba  "  covering.  Toledo  boasts  a  beautiful,  grand 
situation,  like  Edinburgh — a  congestion  of  ruins,  as  if 
all  the  warlike  tribes  since  Iberia  was  a  Eoman  colony 
had  each  thrown  a  stone  on  the  cairn.  Toledo  for 
majesty  and  beauty  is  the  crown  of  Spain.  What  a 
lordly  situation !  Built  on  a  high  rock,  sloping  to  the 
Tagus — "  the  throne  of  Hercules,"  by  whom  the  legends 


THE   ARCHBISHOPS    OF  TOLEDO  349 

say  it  was  built.  Toledo,  with  its  sombre-looking  edi- 
fices, spreading  terrace  wise,  is  worthy  of  the  Goth,  the 
Jew,  the  Moor  who  loved  it ;  better  still,  worthy  of  the 
eagle  eye  of  Charles  Y.,  who,  when  master  of  the  world, 
swept  the  space  between  him  and  India  in  search  of  new 
worlds  to  conquer.  It  is  the  seat  of  grandeur  and 
pride,  massiveness  and  dominion.  It  is  a  rock  -  built 
aery,  crowned  by  all  that  man  can  do,  and  its  ruins  say : 

"  Ye  build  !   ye  build  !   but  ye  enter  not  in." 

Its  steepleless  churches,  dilapidated  walls,  most  beau- 
tiful bridges,  and  Moorish  palaces — well  may  it  recall 
the  poetry  of  the  Moor,  who  says  of  her :  "  She  is,  in- 
deed, the  city  of  delights.  God  has  lavished  on  her 
all  sorts  of  beauties.  He  has  given  her  walls  for  a  tur- 
ban, a  river  for  her  girdle,  and  the  branches  of  trees  for 
stars." 

l!^ow  she  is  the  "  Pompeii  of  Spain '' — only  a  museum. 
The  inhabitants  seem  to  be  taking  a  siesta  after  four 
centuries  of  warlike  activity.  It  is  very  fortunate  for 
the  lover  of  the  picturesque  that  Toledo  was  deserted 
by  Charles  and  Philip  (both  crazy  men),  and  that  they 
left  her  Gothic  and  Saracenic  walls  to  speak  for  them- 
selves of  that  period  of  almost  unearthly  beauty,  when 
the  gay  fancy  of  the  Moor  illuminated  the  more  gloomy 
but  solid  picturesqueness  of  the  Goths. 

Toledo  has  always  been  the  great  church  power  of 
Spain.  It  is  to-day.  The  archiepiscopal  see  of  Ma- 
drid, Cordova,  Jerez,  Carthagena,  Cuenca,  Siguenza, 
Segovia,  Osuna,  and  Yalladolid — all  bow  the  knee  to  this 
great  prelacy.  In  the  sixteenth  century  the  Archbishops 
of  Toledo,  men  of  immense  learning,  boundless  wealth, 
were  a  race  of  mitred  kings.  Here  lived  and  ruled 
Ximenes,  who  held  the  key  to  the  beautiful  conscience  of 


850  AN   EPISTLE   TO   POSTERITY 

Isabella  the  Catholic,  and  turned  it  the  wrong  way  oc- 
casionally. Here  lived  Mendoza,  maker  of  kings.  Here 
the  Primate  of  all  Spain,  by  ruling  his  master's  con- 
science, ruled  the  world.  Here  lived  Pedro  the  Cruel, 
afraid  of  his  own  life,  having  killed  so  many  people, 
and  ruled  by  his  wife,  Maria  de  Padilla,  whom  he  loved 
well,  "  so  fair  she  was."  Here  these  great  churchmen 
headed  armies  and  won  battles,  founded  universities, 
colleges,  and  libraries.  They  were  as  great  in  the  arts 
of  war  as  in  the  arts  of  peace.  They  drew  up  charts 
and  codes  which  we  use  to-day.  I  declare  it  was  a 
glorious  age!  These  walls  tell  the  story  —  how  can 
they  be  so  ruinous  to-day  ?  Here  was  born  that  unfort- 
unate creature,  Juana  la  Loca,  that  mad  daughter  of 
the  serene  Isabella,  whose  fantastic  love  for  her  ruthless 
Philip  le  Bel  has  made  her  story  so  pathetic.  Insanity 
seems  not  uncommon  in  Spain.  Prescott,  if  I  remember 
rightly,  thinks  that  Columbus  was  insane  in  his  old  age; 
that  is,  however,  often  said  of  great  geniuses. 

Of  course,  we  had  to  go  to  the  cathedral  first,  as  it  is 
(so  every  one  says)  "  the  cathedral  of  Spain."  It  is  so 
old  that  nobody  knows  who  founded  it.  It  is  so  grand 
that  we  can  well  believe  that  the  Virgin  Mary  visited 
it  in  ^<o^.  It  is  firmly  believed  that  Our  Gracious  Lady, 
the  Virgin  Mary,  came  down  from  heaven  to  visit  Ilde- 
fonso  with  the  present  of  a  chasuble.  This  is  a  favor- 
ite legend  of  the  Church,  and  Murillo  has  painted  it 
many  times.  Afterwards  the  Moors  pulled  down  the 
church  and  built  a  mosque.  Then  Bishop  Bernard,  sent 
from  France  to  repress  the  Order  of  St.  Benedict  in 
Spain,  tore  down  the  mosque  and  destroyed  all  the 
traces  of  Moslem  worship.  So  the  visit  of  the  Virgin 
appears  to  have  been  the  only  ray  of  heavenly  light, 
the  only  kindly,  gentle,  sweet  superstition,  of  this  bloody 


THE    MOZAEABIC    CHAPEL  851 

Church  for  several  centuries.  I  advise  them  to  keep  to 
the  chasuble.  The  church  was  a  monastery  a  century 
and  a  half.  Then  St.  Ferdinand,  a  great  character  in 
Spanish  history,  had  another  hack  at  it  and  tore  it  all 
to  pieces.  In  122Y  the  first  stone  of  the  present  struct- 
ure was  laid.  For  two  hundred  and  sixty -six  years  the 
work  of  building  went  on  continuously.  It  was  plun- 
dered by  Maria  de  Padilla  in  1621,  and  General  de 
Houssage,  a  worthy  copyist  of  Marshal  Soult,  sacked  it 
again  in  1808. 

Here,  however,  the  early  Spanish  Gothic  reigns  in  all 
its  simplicity,  majesty,  austerity,  and  strength.  For  six 
centuries  all  the  best  artists  of  a  period  when  art  was 
pure  and  high  enriched  this  glorious  cathedral  with  their 
noble  ideas.  A  wealthy  and  enlightened  clergy  con- 
tinued to  make  this  cathedral  a  museum  of  all  the  dif- 
ferent ecclesiological  periods  of  Spain.  There  are  the 
Gothic,  the  Grseco-Roman,  the  Saracenic ;  the  splendor, 
the  lightness,  the  richness  of  detail  of  the  Gothic  of  the 
fifteenth  century ;  there  are  variety,  movement,  and  life. 
Indeed,  a  lifetime  might  well  be  spent  in  this  cathedral, 
so  many  historical,  poetical,  and  artistic  associations  does 
it  arouse.  The  outside,  although  impressive,  is  not  equal 
to  the  inside.  It  lacks  the  admirable  grouping  of  the 
masses,  so  conspicuous  in  the  great  cathedrals  of  Burgos, 
Tarragona,  and  Seville.  Yet  nothing  can  be  more  lovely 
than  the  Mozarabic  Chapel,  with  its  elegant  cupola  and 
Gothic  open-work.  Within  goes  on  that  singular  ser- 
vice known  as  the  "  Unitarian  Creed,"  beloved  of  Car- 
dinal Ximenes — simple,  religious,  which  leaves  out  the 
Athanasian  Creed,  and  is  said  daily.  How  can  I  de- 
scribe the  sculptured  niches,  the  lions  holding  up  es- 
cutcheons, the  forest  of  lofty  columns,  the  chapel  upon 
chapel,  the  five  great  naves,  the  vaults  of  the  roof,  the 


352  AN   EPISTLE  TO   POSTERITY 

eighty -eight  piers,  the  doors,  which  are  magnificent 
pointed  arches ;  the  wealth  of  delicate  tracery,  the  splen- 
did stained  glass ;  the  lovely  shafts  which  stop  half-way 
to  receive  the  descending  arch;  the  more  ambitious 
ones  which  take  the  leaf  of  the  fern,  shoot  upward,  to 
meet  with  a  gracious  curve  the  more  retreating  arch, 
as  a  noble  nature  goes  forward  to  meet  a  retiring  and 
shy  heart !  All,  all  is  beautiful,  poetical,  artistic,  soul- 
inspiring. 

Where  did  they  learn  this  infinity  of  exquisite  detail  ? 
There  are  seven  hundred  and  fifty  stained-glass  windows. 
There  are  five  or  six  great  churches  in  one.  Two  noble 
rose -windows  light  the  transept.  Two  lateral  naves 
wind  with  a  beautiful  sweep  round  the  apse,  and,  as  if 
to  quell  the  questioning  eye  with  perfection,  a  long  gal- 
lery of  curved  diminutive  arches  runs  high  up  along  the 
top  of  the  pillars,  a  sort  of  angel  gateway  to  a  better 
world.  Dying  away  on  the  stone  floor  are  the  Eo3^al 
purples,  the  rose  color,  the  blue,  the  green  of  these  gem- 
like windows,  which  fill  the  church  with  light  and  color. 
It  is  not  a  dim,  religious  light.  Indeed,  my  friend  de- 
clared that  it  was  not  sombre  enough  for  a  church ;  but 
her  youthful  eyes  have  been  quenching  their  radiance 
in  the  dark  interiors  of  Spain,  and  she  loves  the  deep- 
ening shadows. 

The  high  chapel  is  gorgeously  gilt  and  painted  blue. 
It  has  much  splendid  wood  carving,  and  here,  high  up, 
Cardinal  Mendoza,  the  "  King-maker,"  sleeps  in  peace. 
We  think  of  Browning's  wonderful  poem.  How  the 
Bishop  Ordered  his  Torrib  at  St.  Praxed's,  as  we  see 
the  man  of  taste  and  learning  sleeping  in  stone  amidst 
all  this  beauty  which  he  prized  in  life.  The  finest  reja 
(or  iron  gateway)  in  Spain — a  superb  combination  of 
brass,  bronze,  and  iron — shuts  him  in.    The  admirable 


SAN  JUAN  DE   LOS    REYES  363 

finish  and  composition  of  the  bassi-rilievi,  the  colossal 
crucifix — this  must  all  be  a  great  comfort  to  the  learned, 
art-loving  churchman  who,  doubtless,  in  dying,  bespoke 
this  fitting  resting-place : 

"Lay  me  in  St.  Praxed's,  that  is  the  church  for  peace." 

How  I  should  like  to  describe  the  Ketablo,  which 
rises  in  five  stories,  from  the  floor  to  the  very  roof,  a 
magnificent  example  of  florid  Gothic!  This  splendid 
piece  of  wood-carving  was  the  work  of  twenty-seven 
artists,  one  of  whom  was  a  converted  Moor.  You  can 
see  where  his  delicate  fingers  gave  it  some  touch  of  the 
Alhambra.  It  is  a  poem  in  wood-carving,  the  subjects 
all  from  the  New  Testament ;  and  the  wealth  of  orna- 
mentation, the  profusion  of  statuettes,  do  not  mar  the 
general  effect  of  exquisite  grace  and  simplicity.  But 
the  mule  and  the  horse  and  the  crazy  cart  are  outside. 
We  must  not  finger  in  this  great,  this  inexhaustible 
cathedral. 

We  must  go  to  San  Juan  de  los  Eey  es,  where  hang  the 
iron  chains  which  once  the  Moor  fastened  on  Christian 
legs,  and  Ferdinand  and  Isabella  unforged.  They  are 
impressive  ornaments  of  man's  cruelty  to  man  and  of 
what  can  be  done  in  the  name  of  religion.  This  splen- 
did specimen  of  the  Spanish  Gothic  is  the  delight  of 
architects.  It  was  erected  by  Ferdinand  and  Isabella  to 
celebrate  the  victory  which  made  Castile  theirs  forever. 
The  apse  is  most  elegant  and  chaste,  with  two  tiers  of 
arches. 

The  carving  in  this  church  looks  like  ivory  work,  and 
everywhere  is  that  monogram  which  we  never  look  at 
without  emotion,  I.  and  F. — Isabella  and  Ferdinand — 
while  all  about  an  army  of  sculptured  saints  cast  their 
mysterious  shadows  on  the  ground.    The  Alcazar  (which 

23 


354  AN  EPISTLE    TO   POSTERITY 

is  a  palace,  an  empty  house)  would  be  famous  and  beau- 
tiful if  it  had  not  been  almost  destroyed  by  fire.  The 
walls,  the  gates,  the  squares,  the  streets,  and  the  bridges 
remain  to  make  this  one  of  the  most  interesting  of 
ruined  towns.  It  is  mediaBval,  Saracenic,  and  Gothic 
and  Spanish.  It  is  like  nothing  else.  To  descend  into 
the  valley  and  look  up  at  it,  how  rich  it  is !  We  drive 
through  its  streets,  which  are  merely  accidents  —  the 
houses  were  built  first,  and  these  alley-ways  were  dug 
out  afterwards ;  we  look  at  the  gateways,  the  pointed 
horseshoe  arch  flanked  by  two  high  turrets— all  are 
picturesque  and  characteristic.  The  bridge  of  Alcantara 
is  a  wonderful  work.  Two  noble  gateways  tell  you  that 
this  was  built  by  Al-Massem  in  997  to  replace  one  of 
the  eighth  century.  It  was  fortified  by  Enrique  I.  in 
1217,  who  built  for  it  an  imposing  tower.  Under  its 
graceful  arch  sweeps  the  Tagus,  yellow  as  gold — an  im- 
petuous current,  full  of  the  blood  of  conquest  and  of 
greed.  The  bridge  of  San  Martin,  almost  as  beautiful, 
is  a  delightful  subject  for  the  water-colorist.  We  might 
linger  forever  at  La  Puerta  Lordada,  a  Moorish  gate- 
way, from  which  once  dangled  the  gory  head  of  Hixem, 
a  favorite  architectural  ornament  of  the  eighth  century. 
It  is  purely  Moorish  and  wonderfully  fine,  with  its  gi- 
gantic towers  and  narrow  winding  gateway,  small  arch, 
wily,  destructive,  insecure — cautions,  like  the  Moor,  taste- 
ful even  when  cunning. 

It  is  the  evening  sun,  which  lightens  up  these  gray  tow- 
ers, and  tells  us  the  time  has  come  when  we  must  leave 
the  picturesque  crown  of  Spain,  of  ruined  Toledo.  Philip 
II.,  gloomy  ascetic,  rang  its  death-knell  when  he  made 
Madrid  the  capital.  But  he  could  not  take  away  its  beau- 
ty, its  situation,  so  glorious  that  from  every  point  new  vis- 
ions of  beauty  gleam  out  to  charm  the  lingering  traveller. 


THE   ESCORIAL  355 

We  drove  off  to  see  the  Moorish  houses  and  to  buy 
some  "  Toledo  blades."  We  saw  the  only  industry 
which  still  flourishes  in  this  deserted  town.  Knives  of 
such  fine  temper  that  their  delicate  points  will  pierce  a 
copper  cent,  yet  retain  their  sharp  and  unbroken  point ; 
bull-fighters'  swords  which  bend  like  a  ribbon,  which, 
however,  can  break  the  back  of  an  Andalusian  bull ;  ex- 
quisite ornaments,  made  of  steel,  inlaid  with  gold  and 
silver — all  are  worthy  to  point  a  moral  and  adorn  a  tale ; 
but  as  the  "  temper  of  the  blade*"  has  been  made  the 
subject  of  maxims  and  comparisons,  until  the  schoolboy 
dreads  the  sound  of  the  ''  tempered  blade  "  as  he  dreads 
the  ruler,  I  will  forbear. 

El  Escorial,  Spain,  Jwae  4,  1889. 

The  journey  from  Madrid  to  Toledo  is  only  fifty 
miles,  but  it  is  five  centuries  long  if  one  measures  it  by 
the  memories  it  invokes.  We  came  back  to  Madrid  to 
sleep,  and  took  a  fresh  start  for  the  Escorial  the  next 
evening.  I  tried  to  recall,  as  I  crossed  these  arid  plains, 
the  day  when  they  were  covered  with  forests  of  oaks, 
chestnuts,  and  madronos,  and  filled  with  bears,  wolves, 
and  perhaps  wild  boars,  which  Charles  Y.  used  to  shoot 
with  a  crossbow.  The  Kings  of  Castile  came  to  these 
plains  to  hunt  when  Madrid  was  a  city  of  but  little  im- 
portance. As  for  Madrid,  it  was  sometimes  chosen  for 
a  convocation  of  the  Cortes,  or  for  a  coronation,  but  it 
assumed  no  distinction  until  Charles  V.  made  it  his 
residence  in  the  sixteenth  century.  It  was  his  quiet 
hunting-box,  whither  he  fled  from  the  state  of  his  great 
palace  at  Toledo.  It  was  in  1560  that  Philip  II.  de- 
clared it  the  only  court  of  his  united  Spain.  In  this  he 
was  governed  by  the  same  principle  which  influences  us 
sometimes  in  the  choice  of  a  President.     We  avoid  all 


356  AN   EPISTLE   TO   POSTEEITY 

hostile  feeling  by  selecting  the  dark  horse  and  disap- 
pointing everybody  else.  Madrid  was  a  city  free  from 
local  traditions,  and  was  for  that  reason  more  willingly 
acceptable  to  all,  and  reconciled  the  other  rival  claims. 
As  we  left  it  behind  us  we  saw  the  Guadarrama  range 
of  hills,  all  covered  with  snow.  This  is  a  fine  sight,  and 
the  shapes  reminded  us  of  the  White  Mountains  as 
approached  from  Franconia.  "We  ascended  over  wind- 
blown, treeless  plains,  but  we  breathed  a  *'  purer  ether, 
a  serener  air"  than  any  which  had  blessed  our  lungs 
for  a  very  long  time.  It  was  delicious  mountain  air. 
"We  reached  the  Escorial  at  ten  in  the  morning,  and 
drove  to  a  very  comfortable  hotel,  "  La  Miranda," 
where  we  breakfasted. 

This  small  village  is  called  El  Escorial  from  the  scorias 
of  the  iron  mines  which  cover  the  hillsides.  Scorias  in- 
deed !  The  Royal  residence  which  bears  for  us  that 
name  is  really  the  "  Palace  and  Monastery  of  San  Lo- 
renzo el  Eeal."  It  is  in  the  village  Escorial ;  and  if  you 
can  imagine  a  splendid  thing,  a  village  of  stone,  built 
up  half-way  on  Mount  Washington,  you  have  the  Esco- 
rial. I  thought  it  beautiful,  and  Philip  11.  a  man  of 
sense  to  have  built  his  house  amid  such  scenery  and 
with  such  air  to  breathe. 

This  "  leviathan  of  architecture  "  is  a  rectangular  par- 
allelogram— to  be  accurate,  it  covers  a  surface  of  600,000 
square  feet.  It  cost  £660,000  in  1584.  How  much  would 
that  be  now  ?  It  is  majestic,  with  its  four  high  towers, 
and  its  many  little  ones  and  its  fine  dome  make  it  very 
pleasing ;  its  vast  proportions,  admirable  harmony,  mas- 
si  veness,  grandeur — all  framed  by  secluded,  wild,  rocky 
pine  slopes — are  a  picture  indeed  !  Here  Philip  had  his 
palace,  his  church,  his  court,  his  royal  equipage.  I  believe 
five  thousand  people  can  live  in  the  Escorial.    It  is  co- 


PHILIP   THE   SECOND  357 

lossal !  Sixteen  courts,  forty  altars,  eleven  hundred  and 
eleven  windows  outside,  fifteen  hundred  and  sixty-two 
windows  inside,  twelve  hundred  doors,  fifteen  cloisters, 
eighty-six  staircases !  There  were  eighty -nine  fountains 
and  thirty-two  leagues  of  garden  walk.  Now,  from  the 
windows,  about  an  acre  of  very  finished  box  work  of  the 
early  Italian  style  is  visible,  and  some  flowering  trees 
threw  up  their  bright  pink  to  make  the  green  more 
charming;  the  roses  were  clambering  over  the  gray 
walls  of  the  garden,  hiding  them  in  beauty.  Beyond, 
the  splendid  mountain  scenery  arose  in  silent  grandeur. 
It  is  very  impressive. 

How  was  a  lame  woman  to  walk  through  this  vast 
expanse?  I  selected  the  rooms  where  gloomy  Philip 
lived  and  died  so  miserably,  the  broad,  handsome,  beau- 
tifully fitted-up  home  of  the  present  court,  the  library, 
the  church,  and,  later  on  in  the  afternoon,  the  Pantheon, 
where  the  dead  kings  lie  in  grand  marble  halls,  and  gave 
up  the  rest. 

Whether  Philip  II.  inherited  his  gloom  and  insanity 
from  his  grandmother,  crazy  Jane,  or  not,  he  was  cer- 
tainly sincere.  When  he  built  this  oppressively  sub- 
lime and  gigantic  convent  and  palace  he  expressed  not 
only  his  own  peculiar  character,  but  his  legitimate  in- 
heritance as  a  Spaniard — a  race  deeply  tinctured  with 
the  ideas  of  the  East,  ever  seeking  seclusion  for  their 
pleasure,  devotion,  and  business.  Proud  to  an  enormous 
degree,  morbidly  devout,  Philip  was  full  of  character 
and  genius,  and  admirably  artistic.  It  is  a  combination 
of  which  we  Anglo-Saxons  have  little  knowledge.  We 
little  know  the  meaning  of  the  word  "  faith."  We  call 
it  "  superstition,"  but  it  meant  everything  to  Philip  II. ; 
and  to  Charles  Y,,  his  greater  father,  it  meant  every- 
thing. 


O08  AN   EPISTLE   TO   POSTEEITT 

The  church  is  a  triumph  of  the  GraBco-Roman  style, 
and  considered  a  masterpiece.  I  found  it  cold,  naked, 
repulsive.  It  is  a  square  basilica,  assuming  the  shape 
of  a  Greek  cross.  It  has  twenty-four  arches  and  six 
naves.  It  is  adorned  with  kneeling  statues  and  figures 
of  saints,  all  powerfully  rendered.  A  most  touching 
link  with  the  present  is  the  tomb  of  the  late  Queen 
Mercedes,  the  first  wife  of  Alfonso  XII.  (the  poor  young 
King  just  dead,  whose  baby  reigns  in  Spain).  She 
begged  of  them  not  to  lay  her  in  this  gloomy  place,  but 
the  Spanish  etiquette  was  inexorable.  With  her  died 
the  hopes  of  the  Due  de  Montpensier,  who  had  expected 
much  from  the  "  Spanish  marriages." 

This  vast,  lonely  church  is  sorrowful  in  the  extreme. 
The  high  chapel  which  Philip  died  looking  at  is  built 
over  the  Pantheon  where  his  bones  rest.  Mass  goes  on 
forever  over  his  remains.  The  altar  is  made  of  precious 
marbles  and  inlaid  jasper.  The  Retablo  is  glorious, 
composed  of  red  granite,  precious  jaspers,  and  bronze 
gilt.  It  is  the  masterpiece  of  an  Italian,  Giacomo 
Mezzo. 

The  bronze-gilt  and  painted  effigies  of  the  kings  are 
interesting.  One  of  Charles  Y .  and  his  wife,  the  Empress 
Isabella  ;  his  daughter,  the  Empress  Maria ;  his  sisters, 
Eleanora  and  Maria,  is  very  interesting ;  and  that  of 
Philip  II.,  his  fourth  wife,  Anna,  mother  of  Philip  III. ; 
his  third  wife,  Isabella ;  and  his  second  wife,  Doiia  Maria 
of  Portugal,  mother  of  Don  Carlos;  and  behind  her 
"this  much -written -of  Prince,"  looking  very  foolish. 
These  are  all  portraits,  and  said  to  be  wonderful  like- 
nesses. All  there  but  poor  Mary  of  England,  who  loved 
Philip  so  well.  We  visited  the  Sacristia  and  saw  the 
wonderful  wafer  which  bled  when  the  heretics  trod  on 
it.    The  bleeding  saints  and  images  of  our  Saviour 


THE   PANTHEON  359 

which  drop  the  bloody  sweat  that  we  have  seen  are  in- 
numerable. 

There  is  a  beautiful  Carrara-marble  crucifix  made  by 
Benvenuto  Cellini.  It  was  made  for  his  Koyal  patron 
the  Duke  of  Tuscany,  who  gave  it  to  Philip  11.  It  was 
brought  hither  from  Barcelona  on  the  shoulders  of  men. 
The  great  Benvenuto  himself  says  of  it :  "  Although  I 
have  made  several  marble  statues,  I  have  made  but  one 
crucifix,  the  most  difficult  for  art  to  render — that  is,  of 
a  dead  body.  I  speak  of  the  image  of  '  Our  Lord  Cru- 
cified,' for  which  I  studied  a  great  deal,  working  upon 
it  with  the  diligence  and  love  which  such  a  simulacre 
deserves,  and  also  because  I  knew  myself  to  be  the  first 
who  ever  executed  a  crucifix  in  marble." 

We  had  brought  with  us  from  Madrid  a  jpermiso  to 
see  the  Pantheon,  seldom  shown.  This  I  owe,  as  I  do 
many  kindnesses,  to  Sir  Clare  Ford,  the  English  Am- 
bassador. It  is  a  cellar  of  precious  marbles,  gilt  coffins, 
jewelled  crosses ;  all  the  pomp  and  panoply  of  death. 
Here  lie  those  poor  bones  once  bearing  the  exalted 
names  of  Charles  Y.,  Philip  II.,  and  so  on,  down  to  King 
Alfonso  XII.  Marbles  from  Tortosa  and  Biscay,  jas- 
per from  Toledo,  bronze-gilt  ornaments  —  all  that  can 
accompany  the  poor  clay  is  here.  Queen  Isabella  II., 
the  mother  of  Alfonso,  has  her  casket  awaiting  her 
above  that  of  her  son.  She  always  hears  midnight 
mass  when  she  comes  to  Madrid. 

Leaving  the  room  of  the  reigning  monarchs,  we 
wandered  through  several  rooms,  in  one  of  which  I 
found  the  beautiful  recumbent  image  of  Don  John  of 
Austria,  the  hero  of  Lepanto,  the  handsome  fingers 
covered  with  rings.  He  begged  in  that  last  pitiful 
letter  of  his  to  his  half-brother,  Philip,  to  be  buried 
here,  "  as  the  fittest  reward  for  his  services."      Poor 


360  AN   EPISTLE   TO   POSTERITY 

boy,  who  wore  victory  in  his  cap!  The  cold-blooded 
King,  who  heard  of  the  victory  at  Lepanto  without 
moving  a  muscle,  who  left  Don  John  to  perish  mis- 
erably at  Namur,  gave  him,  however,  kingly  sepul- 
ture. Don  John  was  the  handsomest  of  his  race,  a 
magnificent  profile ;  one  of  the  heroes  of  the  world ; 
a  gifted  and  grand  creature,  sacrificed  to  the  lust  of 
power  and  the  enmity  and  hatred  of  his  nearest  of  kin. 
The  library  of  the  Escorial  was  selected  with  care 
and  magnificence.  It  bears  the  stamp  to  -  day  of 
Philip's  accomplished  mind,  so  wide  in  its  intellectu- 
ality, so  barren  morally.  The  Escorial  was  intended 
by  Philip  to  be  the  emporium  of  the  fine  arts,  the 
sciences,  the  letters  of  the  age.  Many  of  the  books  were 
burned  long  ago,  but  their  cases  we  saw.  They  are  of 
ebony,  cedar,  orange,  and  dark  woods.  It  is  a  long,  beau- 
tiful room,  with  that  delicious  atmosphere  which  libra- 
ries always  possess,  as  if  here  dwelt  the  choice  spirits 

of  the  learned. 

"  Around  me  I  behold 
The  mighty  minds  of  old." 

The  portraits  are  singularly  interesting.  After  Charles 
Y.,  aged  forty-nine,  by  Titian,  we  have  Philip  II.  at 
seventy-one,  Philip  III.  at  twenty-three  (he  never  grew 
any  older  in  mind),  and  Charles  II.  at  fourteen.  A 
very  curious  collection  of  Arabic  missals  was  once 
here — a  captured  library  of  the  Emperor  of  Morocco, 
w-ho  offered  £60,000  for  them,  but  he  never  got  them. 
What  once  went  into  Philip's  hands  never  got  out  again, 
or  not  for  long.  Fire,  however,  came  in  1691  and  lasted 
fourteen  days,  consuming  whole  portions  of  the  Escorial. 
The  library  suffered  dreadfully. 

However,  there  is  a  fine  Koran  left,  and  a  "  Codice 
Aureo,"  or  Gospel,  in  four  books,  heavy  with  gold.    It 


A    STRANGE    DISCORD  361 

was  begun  under  Conrad  II.,  Emperor  of  the  West, 
and  finished  about  the  middle  of  the  eleventh  century. 
The  illuminations  are  very  curious.  And  many  fine 
breviaries  belonging  to  Isabella  the  Catholic  and  her 
Eoyal  descendants  are  shown.  We  went  back  to  the 
dark  and  dreary  place  where  Philip's  arm  -  chair  and 
desk,  his  poor  bed,  his  monk-like  cell,  are  as  he  left 
them.  Here  he  suffered  the  agonies  of  gout,  and  bore 
his  great  pain  heroically.  He  wished  the  Avhole  palace 
to  be  a  cell,  but  after  his  death  his  descendants  thought 
differently.  Under  Charles  lY.  the  whole  wing  of  the 
palace  looking  out  over  the  snow  mountains  was  fitted 
up  with  tapestry,  frescoes,  French  furniture,  and  French 
woodwork,  at  a  cost  of  nearly  £300,000.  Here  the 
woodwork,  the  beautiful  gold  and  steel  hinges,  the 
magnificent  tapestries,  fine  pictures  by  Teniers,  by 
Wouverman,  by  Goya,  and  by  French  artists,  are  in 
strange  contrast  to  the  three-legged  stool  on  which 
Philip  rested  his  gouty  foot. 

If  the  Escorial  was  the  emanation  of  a  mighty  mind 
tainted  with  melancholy  —  a  mind  which  loved  to 
ponder  on  the  sombre,  awful,  retributive  side  of  re- 
ligion— it  is  at  least  consistent. 

The  other  gay  rooms  are  inconsistent,  and  bring  in  a 
strange  discord.  It  is  as  if  a  Spanish  dance  were 
played  amid  the  splendid  diapason  of  Beethoven's 
march  "  On  the  Death  of  a  Hero."  You  seem  to  pause 
in  the  midst  of  the  notes  of  a  penitential  psalm  sound- 
ing from  the  mighty  organ,  with,  perhaps,  the  clash 
of  cymbals  and  the  far-reaching  trumpets,  sustaining 
the  muffled  drums  of  a  military  mass,  to  listen  to  the 
rattle  of  castanets  and  the  tinkling  of  guitars. 

Spain  present  is  less  majestic  than  Spain  past.  The 
impression  made  on  me  of  this  sombre  pile  was  not 


363  AN    EPISTLE   TO    POSTERITY 

disappointment,  not  gloom ;  it  was  all  majesty  and 
repose.  It  fits  well  the  extensive,  melancholy  waste ; 
the  treeless,  trackless  desert;  the  mountains  rising  in 
ever-varied  outline  one  upon  the  other.  It  is  lofty,  in- 
spiring, religious,  and  rises,  as  did  his  prayers,  to  God, 
let  us  hope.  Profoundly  sad,  it  tells  of  the  insufficiency 
of  creed,  of  the  futility  of  ambition,  of  the  desperate 
disappointment  w^hich  awaits  any  man  who  lives  for 
himself  and  not  for  others.  Would  that  it  could  be 
made  into  a  grand  hospital  for  the  thousands  of  blind, 
lame,  halt,  sick,  starving  poor  of  Spain !  Then  would 
religion,  devoted  to  philanthropy,  cease  to  be  gloomy. 
Then  would  there  be  a  great  reason  for  the  Escorial. 
Then  would  the  sunny  side  of  God's  love  beam  on  this 
ascetic  sermon  in  stone.  With  mercy,  hope,  bliss,  and 
love  to  irradiate  it,  the  Escorial  would  become  the  bless- 
ing, as  it  is  now  the  wonder,  of  Spain. 

We  came  out  of  Spain  by  Burgos,  where  we  saw  the 
dirtiest  city,  the  worst  hotel,  and  perhaps  the  best  cathe- 
dral in  all  Spain ;  also  a  superb  tomb  to  Don  John  of 
Castile,  erected  by  his  sister,  Isabella  the  Catholic ;  and 
with  this  beautiful  memory  of  the  great  Queen,  who 
sanctified  all  that  she  touched,  we  left  the  most  inter- 
esting country  in  the  w^orld.  At  least  to  us  Americans, 
what  country  can  be  so  interesting  as  that  of  Columbus  ? 
and  now  that  two  of  our  greatest  writers — Prescott  and 
Irving  —  have  written  its  varied  story,  what  country 
should  we  be  more  anxious  to  see  ? 


CHAPTER  XIX 

An  Imaginary  Conversation  with  an  Editor— The  Effect  of  Fashion 
on  Our  Social  Life— Our  American  Society  and  Its  Leaders- 
Snobs  and  Snobbery — Society  and  Its  Mission  in  Our  National 
Life— King  Fashion  and  His  Power— A  Last  Word. 

Perhaps  I  may  be  pardoned  if  I  digress  from  my  rem- 
iniscences to  preach  a  little  sermon  on  a  certain  phase 
in  our  American  social  life  which  has  always  deeply  in- 
terested me.  But  no,  it  shall  not  be  a  sermon,  after  all. 
I  will  adopt  the  Socratic  method  as  the  most  effectual 
vehicle  for  what  I  have  to  say. 

"  I  wonder,"  said  a  handsome  3^oung  editor  to  me  (he 
was  undergoing  the  process  of  being  lionized  at  a  fash- 
ionable watering  -  place)  —  "I  wonder  always  at  the 
prominence  of  certain  sets,  the  power  of  certain  leading 
women,  the  tyranny  of  fashion.  What  does  it  mean  1 
Why  is  not  one  set  as  good  as  another  ?  Why  are  cer- 
tain leaders  elected  whose  dictum  is  infallible  ?  Why 
do  certain  people  create  an  exclusive  atmosphere  into 
into  which  certain  other  people  cannot  penetrate  ?  And 
why  are  you  women  so  afraid  of  each  other?  Why 
has  Mrs.  Brown-Jones's  eye  a  power  which  Mrs.  Jones- 
Brown's  eye  has  not?  I  think  the  one  quite  as  pretty 
a  woman  as  the  other,  quite  as  clever.  What  does  it 
mean  ?" 

"  Well,"  I  answered,  after  due  reflection,  "  you  have 
asked  the  most  unanswerable  of  questions.  If  I  answer 
you  at  all,  it  must  be  only  approximatively ;  it  cannot  be 


864  AN    EPISTLE    TO   POSTERITY 

conclusive.  For  fashion  always,  from  the  beginning  of 
the  world  to  the  present  moment,  has  been  an  undefinable 
term.  You  may  say  that  it  requires  wealth,  beauty, 
good  position,  and  tact  to  become  a  fashionable  leader ; 
and  yet  I  have  known  a  woman  to  hold  all  these  cards 
without  succeeding  in  her  ambition.  Again,  I  have 
known  a  woman  to  become  a  fashionable  leader  who 
held  none  of  them.  It  seems  to  be  a  sixth  sense,  a 
union  of  certain  advantages  and  certain  ambitions.  A 
woman  must  care  to  be  a  leader  first." 

"  But  how  many  care  to  be,  and  work  very  hard  for 
it,  and  never  succeed !"  said  he. 

"  Many,  no  doubt ;  you  have  described  a  very  large 
class,  and  hence  that '  masquerade  of  hate '  which  goes 
on  in  fashionable  society,  which  is  so  full  of  baffled  am- 
bitions and  disappointed  hopes.  A  woman  often  em- 
barks more  talent,  more  work,  more  heart  in  her  enter- 
prise than  you  have  invested  in  your  newspaper,  and  she 
utterly  fails.  Society  will  not  see  her ;  society  will  not 
fall  down  and  worship ;  society  is  neither  influenced  by 
her  nor  afraid  of  her ;  it  neither  loves  nor  fears  her.  Do 
you  wonder  that  she  becomes  soured,  embittered,  and 
scornful,  and  abuses  that  which  she  cannot  conquer  ?" 

"  Yes  ;  I  wonder,  first,  at  her  ambition ;  secondly,  at 
her  being  baffled." 

"  Ah !  That  is  because  you  are  a  man,  and  cannot 
read  the  politics  of  women.  You  are  a  great  student  of 
those  of  men ;  you  have  not  studied  those  of  women." 

"  Because,  you  know,"  said  the  editor,  "  the  man  does 
not  live  who  can  understand  a  woman." 

"  No ;  perhaps  you  would  not  be  so  fond  of  us  if  you 
did." 

"  I  should  not  have  dared  to  say  that." 

*'  I  should  not  have  allowed  you  to.    But '  to  return 


A   SOCIAL   BLUEBERRY   PUDDING  365 

to  our  muttons.'  You  agree  with  me  that  the  forma- 
tion of  a  good  social  position  is  a  very  great  thing. 
The  woman  who  makes  her  parlor  a  rallying -point  for 
nice  people  is  doing  a  great  public  service.  She  who,  in 
a  great  city,  is  a  fashionable  leader  is  a  power  in  the 
state.  She  helps  to  refine,  elevate,  purify  our  great 
American  conglomerate,  where  distinction  and  individu- 
ality are  obliged  to  submerge  themselves  in  the  common 
mass,  and  where  a  high  grade  of  mediocrity,  but  noth- 
ing better,  obtains.  Those  choicer  intelligences  which, 
in  older  and  more  aristocratic  societies,  can  stand  on 
their  glass  pedestals,  isolated  from  the  common  herd, 
have  no  existence  here;  our  institutions  forbid  them. 
We  are  all  mixed  together — a  sort  of  social  blueberry 
pudding,  no  one  berry  any  better  than  any  other  berry. 

"  So,  you  see,  it  is  left  to  a  woman  leader  to  make  this 
particular  pudding  in  a  superior  manner.  She  must 
know  how  to  discriminate  between  those  who  are  to  be 
let  in  and  those  who  are  to  be  kept  out,  for  exclusive- 
ness  is  a  very  necessary  part  of  it — in  fact,  it  is  the 
whole  stock-in-trade  of  one  of  our  most  distinguished 
leaders ;  and  then  she  must  know  how,  and  when,  and 
in  what  proportions  to  mix  her  ingredients." 

"  I  wish,"  said  the  editor,  pensively,  "  that  she  always 
knew  how  to  seat  her  company  at  dinner.  "Why,  last 
evening  I  was  put  between  my  most  intimate  friend 
and  my  most  intimate  enemy,  to  neither  of  whom  did 
I  wish  to  speak.  My  friend  and  I  were  talked  out,  my 
enemy  and  I  wouldn't  speak." 

"That  was  ignorance  and  crass  stupidity,"  safd  I; 
"but  both  those  qualities  can  belong  to  a  leader  of 
fashion." 

"  Then  do  draw  a  line — some  line.  Give  me  an  im- 
aginary picture  of  a  leader.    Do  not  keep  on  drawing 


866  AN   EPISTLE  TO   POSTERITY 

Hhis  impossible  monster,  whom  the  world  never  saw.' 
Tell  me  of  some  one  leader,  and  why  she  has  succeeded." 

I  saw  the  editor  was  getting  irritable.  He  had  eaten 
many  good  dinners,  had  been  much  flattered,  was  up 
late  at  night ;  his  nerves  were  unstrung.  I  took  pity 
on  him,  and  described  three  women  : 

"  One  great  leader  of  fashion  whom  I  knew  succeeded 
by  cruelty  alone.  She,  of  course,  had  talent,  some 
money,  some  prestige  of  family  name.  But  she  came 
to  a  watering-place  with  a  determination  to  succeed,  to 
marry  off  her  young  daughter,  and  to  rule  society.  She 
began  by  being  very  agreeable  (giving  some  choice 
parties),  and  by  propitiating  those  persons  who,  by  reason 
of  their  wealth,  propriety  of  conduct,  and  social  position, 
always  constitute  what  is  called  the  first  circle.  Then 
she  began  to  insult  and  injure  those  who  had  delicacy, 
timidity,  and  modesty,  and  so  she  made  people  afraid 
of  her.  It  became  a  question  whether  Mrs.  Hightowers 
was  going  to  speak  to  you  or  throw  her  fan  in  your 
face.  She  began  to  be  a  terror  to  all  the  weak  people, 
of  whom  there  are  many  in  every  society.  A  want  of 
social  courage  is  a  natural  defect  in  a  society  which  has 
no  defined  boundaries.  Mrs.  Hightowers  went  from 
bad  to  worse.  It  was  known  that  she  could  spoil  the 
career  of  an}'-  young  lady  at  a  watering-place  if  she 
chose.  She  could  also  make  it  a  success.  This  she 
achieved  by  impudence,  self-confidence,  cruelty.  Many 
powerful  families  in  this  country  have  achieved  a  high 
position  by  the  exercise  of  similar  qualities.  Thackeray 
says,  '  The  way  to  succeed  is  to  push.  Stamp  on  your 
neighbor's  foot,  and  will  he  not  draw  it  away  V  Such 
people  have  allies  in  the  modest,  the  timorous,  and  the 
delicate  people  who  hold  themselves  too  high  to  contend 
with  such  a  nature  as  Mrs.  Hightowers's.    We  are  at 


THE   THIRD   LEADER  367 

the  mercy  of  such  people,  to  a  certain  extent,  because 
our  dignity  forbids  our  entering  such  a  field  or  fighting 
such  an  enemy.  So  Mrs.  Hightowers  had  a  short  suc- 
cess." 

"  I  am  so  glad  to  hear  that  it  was  short,"  said  the 
editor.  "  Do  get  to  the  end  of  her,  and  tell  me  about  a 
more  agreeable  leader." 

''  Well,  there  was  Mrs.  Clavering.  She  was  a  simple, 
unambitious  person,  very  beautiful  and  attractive,  and 
with  a  gift  of  exclusiveness.  She  would  give  a  ball,  and 
leave  out  two  or  three  ambitious  aspirants.  The  ball 
would  be  perfect,  for  Mrs.  Clavering  knew  how  to  do 
things.  Therefore,  when  Mrs.  Clavering  gave  another 
ball  there  were  heartaches  and  headaches  lest  the  card 
did  not  come.  People  used  to  say,  on  seeing  her  and 
hearing  her  talk  (for  Mrs.  Clavering  was  by  no  means 
brilliant),  '  How  can  such  a  woman  be  a  leader? '  But, 
you  see,  she  had  the  negative  qualities. 

"  Other  women,  far  more  clever,  would  be  too  clever ; 
they  would  be  too  good-natured;  at  the  last  minute 
they  would  let  in  the  panting  aspirant,  and  thus  lose 
the  prestige  of  refusal.  There  are  only  one  or  two 
such  leaders  as  this,  but  they  are  the  most  clever 
of  all. 

"  Then  comes  a  third  leader,  Mrs.  Devonshire  we  will 
call  her.  She  has  wealth,  high  position ;  she  is  the  wife 
of  a  dignitary ;  she  has  to  receive  all  sorts  of  people, 
but  she  has  such  tact,  such  goodness,  such  delicacy, 
such  discrimination,  that  her  salon  never  degenerates. 
She  works  like  a  hero ;  no  Joan  of  Arc  ever  stormed  or 
took  a  more  forlorn  hope  than  that  which  this  lady 
perpetually  conquers;  for  she  encounters  vulgarity, 
social  ignorance,  stupidity,  pretension,  and  fashion  ; 
mixes  them  all  into  her  pudding,  and  produces  a  sue- 


868  AN    EPISTLE   TO    POSTERITY 

cessful  result.  She  creates  a  salon  to  which  the  most 
exclusive  are  glad  to  be  admitted,  and  from  which  the 
most  vulgar  and  pretentious  come  away  improved.  But, 
I  am  sorry  to  say,  such  leaders  are  not  common.  I  only 
know  one  such." 

"  I  fear  you  do  not,"  said  the  editor.  "  If  there  were 
many  of  them,  society  would  be  a  much  more  fascinat- 
ing thing  than  it  is.  But  I  now  wish  to  ask  you  to 
define  the  word  '  snob.'  I  have  read  Thackeray  on  the 
subject,  and  I  rise  from  the  perusal  still  uneducated. 
Please  to  define  and  interpret  for  me  the  conduct  of 
certain  individuals  who,  at  the  fashionable  watering- 
place  of  Fish's  Eddy,  court  and  run  after  Mrs.  Claver- 
ing  and  her  set,  and  will  not  know  Mrs.  Fotheringay 
and  her  set.  Now,  I  have  dined  with  Mrs.  Fother- 
ingay, found  her  house  charming,  and  her  guests  well- 
bred  and  dehghtful;  while  her  sons  and  daughters 
seemed  to  have  all  the  accomplishments.  Mrs.  Foth- 
eringay herself  was  a  well-bred  lady;  yet  I  am  told 
that  they  are  not  fashionable,  and  '  know  nobody.' 
What  does  this  mean  f 

*'  Well,  it  means  that  Mrs.  Fotheringay  has  been  in 
Europe  a  great  deal ;  she  does  not  care  much  for  '  sets ' ; 
she  is  too  dignified  to  take  any  steps  towards  what  is 
called  a  '  fashionable  position ' ;  she  is  too  good  for  it ; 
she  prefers  to  wait  and  let  people  find  her  out;  she 
stands  on  her  own  platform  securely,  and  hesitates  to 
try  her  neighbors. 

"  One  of  these  days  some  fashionable  young  man  will 
want  one  of  her  pretty  daughters.  They  will  be  mar- 
ried, and  then  Mrs.  Clavering's  set  will  call  on  Mrs. 
Fotheringay,  and  she  will  become  fashionable." 

"  I  feel  that  I  am  constantly  knowing  less  and  less 
what  fashion  means,"  said  the  editor. 


OUR   AMERICAN   SOCIETY  AND   ITS   LEADERS  369 

"As  language  is  given  to  us  to  conceal  our  ideas, 
I  seem  to  be  making  a  success  of  my  explanation," 
said  I. 

"  What  place  has  wealth  in  this  tyranny?"  asked 
the  editor. 

"  It  has  a  very  commanding  place  always  in  so- 
ciety, for  society  includes  nowadays  luxury.  You 
may  say,  generally,  that  it  is  a  very  important  thing 
to  be  beautiful,  for  a  woman ;  yet,  as  we  see  that 
the  very  great  beauties  do  not.-always  gain  hearts  as 
the  plainer  women  do,  so  the  great  fortunes  do  not 
always  make  their  possessors  either  famous  or  fashion- 
able. We  have  some  eminent  instances  of  very  rich 
women  who  are  at  the  same  time  accomplished  leaders 
of  fashion,  but  we  have  also  many  instances  of  others 
who  are  not.  I  should  say  tact  was  worth  much  more 
than  wealth  as  a  road  to  leadership." 

"  What  do  you  mean  by  '  tact '  ?" 

"  I  mean  that  subtile  apprehension  which  teaches  a 
person  how  to  do  and  say  the  right  thing  at  the  right 
time.  It  coexists  with  very  ordinary  qualities,  and  yet 
many  great  geniuses  are  without  it.  Of  all  human  quali- 
ties I  consider  it  the  most  convenient — not  always  the 
highest;  yet  I  would  rather  have  it  than  many  more 
shining  qualities." 

"  Now,  tell  me,"  said  the  editor,  "  why  are  all  social 
leaders  so  tyrannical  ?" 

"  You  harp  on  that  word  perpetually,"  said  I,  laugh- 
ing ;  "  and  why  ?" 

"  I  have  just  seen  a  case  of  social  ostracism  that  was 
entirely  undeserved,"  said  he. 

"  Describe  it  to  me,  and  I  will  venture  to  read  the 
riddle." 

"  A  very  pretty  young  married  woman,  with  her  hus- 


870  AN  EPISTLE   TO   POSTERITY 

band,  arrived  at  the  Pine-Tree  House  at  Fish's  Eddy- 
in  the  height  of  the  season.  She  sang  delightfully  for 
us  every  evening,  and,  being  beautiful,  well-dressed,  rich, 
and  educated,  I  predicted  a  success  for  her.  So,  as  the 
Mrs.  Clavering  of  the  period  was  giving  a  ball,  I  asked 
for  an  invitation  for  my  pretty  friend." 

"  *  What !  that  woman  V  said  Mrs.  Clavering. 

"  '  Yes,'  said  I.    '  Do  you  know  anything  against  her  V 

''  ^  Oh,  she  is  so  common  !  She  sings  every  evening 
at  the  Pine-Tree  House,  and  everybody  knows  about 
her.' 

"  *  Is  not  that  a  condition  of  fashionable  success,  that 
every  one  should  know  about  one  V  said  I. 

"  Mrs.  Clavering  gave  me  a  look,  and  begged  politely 
to  refuse  my  request.  'Now,  there  arrived  at  the  Pine- 
Tree  House  another  young  married  lady,  not  half  so 
presentable  or  nice,  from  the  same  town  as  my  first 
love  (whom  I  will  call  Mrs.  Daisy),  l^umber  two  (whom 
I  will  call  Mrs.  Buttercups)  immediately  got  acquaint- 
ed with  some  fashionable  young  men,  and  was  invited 
everywhere  ;  now  why  was  that  ?" 

"  I  think  I  can  explain :  Mrs.  Daisy  should  have 
adopted  a  different  code  of  social  ethics ;  she  should  not 
have  sung,  she  should  have  let  Mrs.  Clavering  discover 
her  and  bring  her  out.  Mrs.  Clavering  did  not  want 
an  old  sensation — one  that  had  been  heard  at  the  Pine- 
Tree  House — she  wanted  a  new  one.  Mrs.  Daisy  was 
too  pure  and  good  and  natural  to  know  or  care  about 
this,  perhaps.  She  sang  as  a  bird  sings,  without  thought 
that  she  was  thus  throwing  away  an  introduction  into 
society.  Now,  Mrs.  Buttercups  got  the  best  of  allies 
on  her  side  by  making  herself  fascinating  to  certain 
young  men  who  have  the  entree  to  all  these  houses.  It 
is  not  a  handsome  way  of  getting  invitations,  but,  un- 


ONE    CURIOUS    EXPERIMENT  OF  EQUALITY  371 

fortunately,  it  is  too  common.  It  is  a  part  of  that  thirst 
for  fashionable  distinction  which  has  possessed  the  mind 
of  Americans,  just  as  Wall  Street  has  driven  the  men 
crazy  to  be  rich." 

"  It  seems  to  me  that  there  is  a  constant  temptation 
to  meanness  and  selfishness  and  smallness  in  this  strug- 
gle for  fashion,"  said  the  editor. 

"  Will  you  tell  me  is  there  any  human  struggle  in 
which  there  is  not  the  same  temptation  ?  Is  the  strug- 
gle for  political  success  any  more  ennobling?  Is  the 
struggle  to  get  rich  any  more  generous  ?" 

"  ^No  ;  they  are  all  marked  by  human  infirmity ;  but 
then  the  struggle  is  for  greater  things." 

"  Ah !  there  we  take  issue,"  said  I.  "  This  passion 
for  social  distinction  is  as  old  as  the  Pyramids.  To 
have  your  rank,  to  stand  well  with  your  contempora- 
ries, is  not  an  ignoble  ambition.  I  grant  you  that  our 
curious  experiment  of  equality  has  brought  about  some 
absurd  and  impalpable  and  false  barriers,  which  certain 
people  essay  to  build  up  against  another  set — certain 
street  barricades  thrown  up  in  a  passion,  bloodily  fought 
for,  and,  when  gained,  w^orth  nothing ;  it  is  a  kind  of 
guerilla  warfare  which  is  waged  every  winter  by  cer- 
tain women  with  ambition  and  bad  temper;  but  that 
is  not  society.  That  is  one  of  the  consequences  of  new- 
ness. To  gain  admission  to  certain  salons  which  you 
and  I  know  and  admire  is  a  different  thing.  We  know 
the  women  who  preside  over  them  confer  distinction 
by  their  acquaintance  ;  we  know  that  in  their  houses 
we  shall  meet  society  winnowed  of  its  vulgarity,  pre- 
tension, and  ignorance — we  shall  find  individuals.  As 
Margaret  Fuller  said,  'to  have  unity,  you  must  first 
have  units.'  Our  friend  knows  where  to  find  the  units, 
and  she  combines  with   them  luxury,  fashion,  dress. 


872  AN   EPISTLE   TO   POSTEEITY 

splendor — all  that  can  intoxicate  the  senses — without 
leaving  a  ^to-morrow'  in  the  cup.  There  are  such 
houses  in  our  American  society.  To  be  ambitious  to 
gain  a  foothold  in  them  is  not  unworthy  of  the  most 
dignified  neophyte." 

"  Certainly  not,"  replied  the  editor,  "  but  I  wish 
there  were  not  so  many  who  are  wiUing  to  go  by  the 
back  stairs." 

"  Ah !  You  must  remember  that  snobs  are  born,  and 
not  made." 

"  Did  I  not  ask  you  a  short  time  ago  to  define  the 
word  '  snob '  ?" 

"  Yes,  and  I  turned  the  conversation,  for  it  is  almost 
impossible ;  however,  I  will  try.  A  refined  snob  is  a 
person  of  otherwise  good  qualities,  of  which  reverence 
is  one ;  but  he  has  not  the  courage  of  his  opinions — he 
is  a  victim  of  social  cowardice.  He  is  afraid,  in  fact, 
of  his  own  social  position,  perhaps  entirely  without  rea- 
son ;  but  you  cannot  call  courage  to  a  heart  which  has 
it  not.  Therefore,  he  is  a  victim  to  the  social  leaders, 
who  have  that  priceless  commodity,  impudence.  The 
respectable  snob  lives  in  perpetual  fear  of  phantoms, 
which  he  conjures  up  for  himself.  He  fears  that  Mrs. 
Clavering  looked  coldly  on  him,  that  Miss  Brown- Jones 
will  not  dance  with  him ;  in  fact,  the  respectable  snob 
has  no  easy  life.  If  a  woman,  she  suffers  tortures. 
Every  social  occasion  is  freighted  with  dangers  and 
pin-pricks. 

"  The  vulgar  snob  is  a  far  coarser  creature.  He  is 
generally  a  foreigner  of  ignoble  antecedents,  who  finds 
in  our  country  a  position  he  never  could  have  held  in 
his  own.  His  tyranny  is  immense,  if  he  gets  high 
enough ;  his  subserviency  absurd,  if  he  is  kept  down.  I 
have  known  the  native  vulgar  snob  occasionally;  but 


SOCIETY  AND   ITS  MISSION  IN   OUR   NATIONAL   LIFE      373 

to  blossom  into  full  luxuriance  the  snob  must  be  a 
foreigner.  To  be  a  snob  argues  a  profound  absence  of 
self-respect ;  perhaps  the  sufferer  should  be  more  pitied 
than  blamed. 

"  It  is  to  this  element,  this  presence  of  snobbism,  that 
we  owe  much  of  the  failure  of  society.  It  disgusts  the 
honest  and  the  sensible.  They  meet  it  always  at  the 
portals  of  the  great  world,  and  they  retire  before  it. 
Certain  brave  and  modest  and  genuine  young  men 
shun  it  as  an  unclean  thing.  Th^y  see  their  comrades 
whom  they  have  not  respected,  perhaps  at  school  or 
college,  or  on  the  ball-field,  or  in  the  rowing-match — 
men  who  are  their  inferiors  in  every  respect — they  see 
these  men  succeeding  in  society,  and  through  a  sub- 
servient, slavish  snobbery.  They  naturally  conclude 
that  a  society  which  endures  such  things  must  be  a  sort 
of  place  which  they  will  not  enjoy,  and  they  retire  ac- 
cordingly, taking  from  society  the  element  that  it  so 
much  needs — their  sincere  selves." 

"  One  hates  a  coward,  anyway,"  said  the  editor. 

"  Yes,  and  a  coward  who  succeeds,  even  measurably, 
through  his  cowardice  is  doubly  hated.  But  I  think 
there  should  be  more  pity  for  snobs ;  just  as  you  pity 
the  deformed  and  the  maimed :  they  are  not  to  blame." 

"  How  long  does  a  social  leader  last  in  this  country  ?" 
inquired  my  companion,  who  was  given  to  statistics. 

"  Well,  not  long  ;  the  same  rotation  in  office  prevails 
as  in  politics.  It  would  be  much  better  if  they  lasted 
longer.  You  see,  our  society  needs  a  head.  Having  no 
queen,  no  nobility,  we  have  no  standard  in  social  poli- 
tics, no  party  to  hail  from.  As  in  every  other  profes- 
sion, practice  makes  perfect,  and  those  women  who  have 
been  long  at  the  work  are  much  better  fitted  to  make  a 
society  which  shall  represent  at  least  some  elements  of 


374  AN   EPISTLE   TO   POSTERITY 

agreeability  than  those  who  come  to  it  newly.  As  a 
consequence,  we  occasionally  have  a  dull  winter,  a  dull 
summer  at  a  watering-place,  when  a  good  leader  would 
have  made  the  whole  thing  very  gay.  We  very  much 
need  a  master  of  ceremonies  at  the  watering-places  to 
introduce  people,  and  to  keep  out  the  adventuresses, 
who  are  making  their  way  perpetually  into  the  society 
which  should  know  them  not.  We  need  a  censor  of  pub- 
lic morals,  too;  but  that  we  never  shall  have." 

"And  a  hospital  for  those  who  are  killed  by  the 
cruelty  of  women,"  said  the  editor.  "  I  mean  other 
women.  I  have  seen  elderly  women  so  cruel  to  young 
ones — old  society  leaders  killing  young  and  handsome 
neophytes  with  a  glance,  those  in  good  society  looking 
so  askance  at  those  who  are  not.  I  want  a  hospital  for 
the  wounded !" 

"  Oh,  you  may  save  your  pity !  The  young  and  hand- 
some ones  are  very  recuperative,  and  they  have  a  terri- 
ble revenge.     Time  is  fighting  for  them  all  the  time." 

"  But  I  have  seen  some  delicate  souls  wounded  to  the 
death,"  said  he. 

"  So  have  I.  Fashion  has  its  story  of  Keats,  of  that 
handsome  young  actor  Walter  Montgomery,  who  shot 
himself  because  the  critics  pitched  into  him  so  merci- 
lessly ;  and  then,  too  late,  they  found  out  that  he  was 
the  most  romantic  of  Komeos.  Fashion  has  its  parallel 
to  the  boy  Chatterton,  no  doubt ;  I  have  known  a  gifted 
and  lovely  w^oman  stung  to  madness  by  social  arrows, 
by  the  wounds  inflicted  by  the  hands  of  other  and  jeal- 
ous women ;  but  such  tragedies  are  rare." 

"  I  must  say  that  even  one  such  takes  away  the  taste 
for  society,"  said  the  editor. 

"  And  yet  one  or  two  failures  have  not  impaired  your 
interest  in  politics,"  said  I. 


KING  FASHION   AND    HIS   POWER  375 

"  You  are  unfair  in  your  argument.  Politics  is  busi- 
ness.    Society  is  a  pleasure,"  replied  he. 

"  l!^o,  I  think  society  is  a  business ;  it  becomes  so  in 
its  practical  working,  and  you  find  in  it,  as  I  have  said, 
only  the  imperfections  of  our  common  nature.  The 
jealousies  of  the  convent  are  quite  as  narrow  and  bit- 
ter and  cruel  as  those  of  society,  and  the  benefits  less. 
See  how  society  and  social  attraction  brighten  up  the 
mind !  One  says  unexpectedly  good  things  at  a  dinner, 
or  in  the  presence  of  a  gay  company.  That  is  one  of 
the  advantages." 

"  But  I  think  society  very  levelling.  I  think  fashion 
extinguishes,  or  aims  at  extinguishing,  wit.  Emerson 
says  that  ^  the  constitutions  which  can  bear  in  open  day 
the  rough  dealing  of  the  world  must  be  of  that  mean 
and  average  structure  such  as  iron  and  salt,  atmospheric 
air  and  water ;  but  there  are  metals  like  potassium  and 
sodium,  which,  to  be  kept  pure,  must  be  kept  under 
naphtha.'  So  I  think  the  best  elements  of  the  human 
mind  evaporate  in  the  air  of  fashion,  and  only  the  com- 
monplace flourishes." 

"  There  is  a  great  deal  in  what  you  say,  no  doubt. 
The  commonplace  and  the  vulgar  have  great  vitality 
in  them,  like  certain  weeds ;  but  I  still  think  there  are 
many  flowers  which  flourish  in  the  atmosphere  of  fash- 
ion. Look  at  the  beautiful,  pure  young  daughters  of 
our  best  houses,  how  they  adorn  and  are  adorned.  Look 
at  the  grace  it  introduces,  the  courtesy,  the  elegance, 
the  picture  which  it  makes !  Contrast  a  salon  at  New- 
port with  one  at  Julesburg  or  Salt  Lake  City,  and  which 
do  you  prefer  ?" 

"  Decidedly  Newport,  which  is  one  of  the  perfect 
places  of  the  world ;  for  there  you  have  fashion  en- 
grafted on  home,  social  science  with  a  background  of 


876  AN   EPISTLE   TO   POSTERITY 

respectability  and  reality.  There  the  American  people 
take  their  pleasure  with  a  certain  deliberateness  and 
quietude  which  do  not  exist  elsewhere.  Bonaparte  said 
he  found  the  *  vices  were  very  good  patriots '  when  he 
laid  a  tax  on  brandy.  The  virtues  are  good  patriots, 
and  one  forgives  the  lavish  expenditure  in  equipage  and 
dinners  and  dress  when  one  sees  the  patriots  who  in- 
dulge in  these  things  teaching  a  whole  nation  good 
taste,"  said  the  editor. 

"  I  wish  the  tyranny  of  fashion  would  give  us  a  E'apo- 
leon  I.,"  said  I ;  "an  absolute  monarch  whose  decisions 
were  final.  I  think  it  would  quiet  so  many  uneasy 
souls,  and  bring  about  such  delicious  peace.  I  believe 
in  absolute  monarchy — '  a  despotism  tempered  by  assassi- 
nation,' a  good  tyrant." 

"  Then  I  should  open  all  the  terrors  of  the  newspaper 
upon  him,  and  he  would  be  crushed  by  the  immense 
engine  of  the  press,"  said  the  editor. 

"  J^ever,"  said  I.  "  King  Fashion  cannot  be  crushed. 
He  has  a  thousand  lives,  a  million  heads ;  you  and  your 
great  newspaper  would  be  the  first  to  bow  before  him, 
and  to  own  up  to  his  power.  All  mankind  and  woman- 
kind have  done  it  always,  and  will  do  it  forever.  His 
great  realm  is  boundless,  his  revenues  enormous.  How 
many  millions  do  we  pay  annually  for  artificial  flowers  ? 
More  than  we  pay  for  iron !  There  is  no  trouble  in  col- 
lecting the  revenues  of  King  Fashion ;  his  subjects  are 
enthusiastically  loyal — don't  you  think  so  ?" 

"  Perhaps,"  said  the  editor.  "  At  any  rate,  I  will 
allow  you — the  last  word." 

In  tr\nng  to  rescue  from  the  "  full- voiced  past "  that 
which  I  remember  as  having  been  a  great  pleasure,  and 
now   bewail  as  being  a  distinct   loss    in  our  present 


THE    "artist   receptions"  377 

society,  I  must  mention  the  "  artist  receptions,"  given 
ever}^  spring  by  the  artists  of  the  brush,  often  in  their 
own  studios,  sometimes  in  the  Academy  of  Music  or  in 
some  large  hall,  the  invitations  being  by  card.  These 
were  festive  to  a  degree,  and  owed  their  inception,  I 
suspect,  to  my  friend  John  W.  Ehninger,  who  had  come 
here  from  Europe  early  in  the  fifties,  bringing  with  him 
much  aroma  of  that  student  life  which  we  have  all  since 
seen  and  enjoyed  in  Eome  and  in  Paris.  He  was  a  man 
of  society,  a  brilliant  wit,  and  made  his  own  studio  de- 
lightful wherever  it  was,  giving  little  informal  spreads. 
Darley,  a  less  social  but  very  handsome  man,  was  apt  to 
be  present ;  and  Winthrop  Chanler  and  Theodore  Win- 
throp  were  sure  to  happen  in.  At  the  mysterious  studio 
in  West  Tenth  Street  Mr.  Church  exercised  a  rather 
magnificent  hospitality  under  the  very  smile  of  the 
"Temperate  Tropics,"  his  great  picture,  where  a  brill- 
iant blue  butterfly  added  its  own  azure  to  the  scene. 
After  he  left  that  great  room  Mr.  Bierstadt  took  it,  and 
was  regally  hospitable.  I  remember  that  he  entertained 
Lord  Dufferin  there  at  a  very  handsome  breakfast. 

All  united  together  —  Kensett,  Eastman  Johnson, 
Whittredge,  McEntee,  the  two  Giffords,  and  the  other 
geniuses  of  that  day — to  give  us  yearly  an  artists'  re- 
ception— a  public  affair  at  which  the  ladies  wore  their 
prettiest  bonnets  and  gowns,  and  it  came  very  near 
to  the  famous  Varnishing  Day  in  Paris. 

I  know  of  no  such  easy,  pleasant  way  of  meeting 
each  other  nowadays.  Although  the  gorgeous  enter- 
tainments of  our  gifted  architect  Stanford  White  in  his 
own  Giralda  Tower  may  be  a  fitting  successor,  they  are 
not  for  us  all.  Music  has  taken  to  giving  parties,  at 
Carnegie  Hall,  in  place  of  her  sister  art  of  Painting. 
She  is  the  hostess  now. 


878  AN   EPISTLE   TO   POSTEElTY 

I  miss,  too,  the  smaller  circumference  of  the  Academy 
of  Music,  where  one  listened  to  the  charming  voice  of 
Nilsson  in  Mignon,  or  applauded  our  own  Clara  Louise 
Kellogg  in  Marguerite,  and  could  see  all  one's  own 
circle  of  friends  in  one  wandering  glance  around  the 
house.  ]^ow  who  knows  anybod}^,  or  can  see  anybody, 
in  the  great  cosmopolitan  Metropolitan  Opera  House? 
It  is  far  more  grand,  but  is  it  as  dear  and  as  personal  ? 
No. 

We  miss  the  great  stars  like  Booth  and  Salvini ;  we 
miss  the  finish  and  social  importance  of  Wallack's 
Theatre ;  we  miss  that  which  splendor  cannot  obliter- 
ate— the  greater  study,  the  conscientious  fidelity  to  the 
rules  of  their  art  of  those  old  stock  actors  like  John 
Gilbert,  Mrs.  Sefton,  the  Wallacks  and  the  Hollands, 
Stoddart,  and  "Walcot. 

As  for  music,  it  seems  an  unparalleled  non  sequitu7\  in 
the  face  of  the  great  Wagner  cult,  to  say  that  I  should 
like  to  hear  Lucia  and  La  Gazza  Ladra  again,  not  to 
mention  La  Grande  Ducliesse  and  Perichole. 

It  was  a  nice,  sociable  little  city  forty  years  ago,  but 
we  have  grown  both  larger  and  smaller.  We  had  two 
very  fine  costume  balls  at  which  I  assisted — one  rather 
ruled  by  Mrs.  Belmont  —  at  Delmonico's,  somewhere 
about  1875  or  '6,  and  another,  in  1883,  at  Mr.  W.  K. 
Yanderbilt's.  They  did  not  excite  half  the  talk,  the 
criticism,  that  one  given  in  1897  has  done.     Why  ? 

Whose  business  is  it  how  rich  people  spend  their 
money  ?  If  they  have  it  they  will  spend  it ;  and  for- 
merly we  accepted  the  situation  (and  the  invitation) 
and  enjoyed  the  ball.  So  that  it  seems  to  me  that  in 
the  best  sense  l!^ew  York  was  larger  and  more  cos- 
mopolitan than  it  is  to-day. 

The  late  Charles  Astor  Bristed  wrote  a  most  excel- 


THE  GREAT  SUNBURST  OF  THE  FUTURE       379 

lent  pamphlet  on  "  The  Interference  Theory  of  Govern- 
ment," which  might  well  be  quoted  now  apropos  of  the 
advice  given  to  an  opulent  host  and  hostess :  "  Why  talk 
about  '  Culpable  Luxury  V  —  all  tasteful  luxury  is  the 
friend  of  art  and  refinement ;  extravagance  is  not  lux- 
ury." I  think  Bristed  was  just  then  angry  at  some  news- 
paper criticisms  on  wine -drinking — some  temperance 
movement — but  he  made  a  good  plea  for  the  liberty  of 
the  subject. 

To-day  there  are  a  hundred  N'eV  Yorks,  each  having 
its  own  life  and  its  separate  circles,  its  geographical  and 
its  social  divisions,  yet  all  driving  out  through  one 
Fifth  Avenue  to  one  lovely  Park,  and  at  evening  all 
reading  the  papers,  to  see  what  the  others  are  doing. 
Let  us  be  as  large  as  London  or  Paris,  neither  of  which 
would  concern  itself  about  one  fancy  ball  more  or  less. 

The  Park,  the  Metropolitan  Museum  of  Art,  the  fine 
churches,  the  grand  array  of  talent  in  these  churches, 
the  beautiful  music  in  them  (rivalling  the  choirs  of 
Westminster  Abbey  and  St.  Paul's),  the  endless  con- 
certs, and  the  clubs,  literary,  social,  and  philanthropic, 
leave  little  to  be  desired.  Best  of  all,  the  educational 
privileges.  The  Cooper  Union,  for  art  students,  has 
long  been  a  blessing.  The  young  women,  what  can 
they  not  learn,  what  can  they  not  achieve,  with  Colum- 
bia University  annex  thrown  open  to  them  ? 

In  this  great  outlook  for  women's  broader  intellectual 
development  I  see  the  great  sunburst  of  the  future.  I 
have  not  lived  in  vain  if  I  have  done  my  mite  to  help 
it  along. 

To  the  girls  of  the  coming  age  I  would  offer  a 
congratulatory  hand. 

"  What  you  can  do,  or  dream  you  can,  begin  it ; 
Boldness  hath  genius,  power,  and  magic  in  it." 


AN   EPISTLE   TO   POSTERITY 


Only  I  hope  the  sweet  type  of  the  past,  the  gentle 
Phyllis,  the  womanly  girl,  may  not  be  left  out. 

The  girl  of  the  future  should  embody  all  the  types— 
the  rose,  and  also  the  bud  with  all  its  "sweetest  leaves 
yet  folded." 


THE  END 


MANNEES  AND  SOCIAL  USAGES 


Manners  and  Social  Usages  in  America.  By  Mrs. 
John  Sherwood.  New  and  Revised  Edition.  16mo, 
Cloth,  Ornamental,  $1  25. 

There  is,  we  should  say,  no  doubt  that  this  is  the  best  American 
book  oil  the  topics  indicated  by  the  title,  and  we  have  no  hesitation 
in  heartily  commeudiug  it  as  such.  It  is  the  special  merit  of  the 
book  that  it  does  not  confine  itself  to  cut-aud-dried  rules  of  etiquette, 
but  abounds  in  sensible  suggestions  and  brief  and  intelligent  discus- 
sions of  social  ethics.  It  is  also  an  essentially  readable  book. — Chris- 
tian Union,  N.  Y. 

As  a  guide  to  the  most  refined  observance  of  social  etiquette  in 
America,  it  has  won  general  indorsement  and  esteem.  —  Saturday 
Evening  Gazette,  Boston. 

Relates  to  every  imaginable  phase  of  the  subject,  treats  all  points 
with  refinement,  good  sense,  and  knowledge  from  the  fashionable 
standpoint.  It  is  designed  not  to  treat  the  subject  from  the  ethical 
or  didactic  point  of  view,  but  to  describe  simply  the  customs  that 
l^revail  in  the  most  representative  circles  of  American  fashion.  Its 
value  depends  on  the  fact  that  that  service,  such  as  it  is,  has  been 
rendered  by  no  one  else  as  well  as  by  the  author  of  this  manual. — 
Independent,  N.  Y. 

Mrs.  Sherwood's  admirable  little  volume  differs  from  ordinary 
works  on  the  subject  of  etiquette,  chiefly  in  the  two  facts  that  it  is 
founded  on  its  author's  personal  familiarity  with  the  usages  of  really 
good  society,  and  that  it  is  inspired  by  good  sense  and  a  helpful 
spirit.  There  is  nothing  of  pretence  in  it,  nothing  of  that  weak  wor- 
ship of  conventionality  which  gives  the  stamp  of  essential  vulgarity 
to  the  greater  part  of  what  is  written  on  this  subject.  .  .  .  We  think 
Mrs.  Sherwood's  little  book  the  very  best  and  most  sensible  one  of  its 
kind  that  we  ever  saw. — iV.  Y.  Commercial  Advertiser. 

We  have  no  hesitation  in  declaring  it  to  be  the  best  work  of  the 
kind  yet  published.  The  author  shows  a  just  appreciation  of  wliat 
is  good  breeding  and  what  is  snobbishness.  ...  In  happy,  discrimina- 
tions the  excellence  of  Mrs.  Sherwood's  book  is  conspicuous. — Brook- 
lyn Union. 

Published  by  HARPER  &  BROTHERS,  New  York 

l£T  The  above  work  is  for  sale  by  all  booksellers,  or  will  be  sent  by  the 

publishers,  postage  prepaid,  on  receipt  of  the  price. 

1 


A  TKAI^SPLANTED  EOSE 


A  Story  of  New  York  Society.     By  Mrs.  John  Sher- 
wood.    16ino,  Paper,  50  cents. 

The  story  is  cleverly  told,  and  gives  a  picture  of  metropolitan 
society  which  is  realistic  in  the  extreme.  The  author  writes  from  an 
intimate  knowledge,  and,  as  she  has  the  gifts  of  wit  and  humor,  por- 
trays her  characters  in  graphic  sketches.  A  piquant  undertone  of 
satire  serves  further  to  gratify  the  reader. — Boston  Traveller. 

The  narrative  is  vivacious,  there  is  plenty  of  incident,  and  the 
book  is  very  entertaining. — N.  Y.  Herald. 

The  story,  aside  from  its  plot,  whicli  is  interesting,  is  a  clever 
satire  on  New  York  society.  The  flirt,  the  politician,  the  parvenu, 
the  lady-killer,  the  very  young  man,  and  the  leader  of  fashion,  are 
admirably  depicted — BrooMyn  Eagle. 

A  bright  and  satisfactory  story.  .  .  .  Throughout  the  whole  the 
reader  is  entertained  by  the  wit  and  satire,  the  graphic  portrayal  of 
character,  and  the  vivid  description  of  certain  phases  of  fashionable 
life. — Boston  Transcript. 

An  untutored  child  of  nature,  the  heroine  is  used  by  the  author 
with  admirable  effect  as  a  foil  to  set  off  the  highly  artificial  cliaracter 
of  the  social  arrangements  of  life  among  the  wealthy  classes.  The 
plot  is  intricate,  ingenious,  and  full  of  exciting  incidents,  and  the 
characters  through  whose  agency  it  is  developed  are  types  of  persons 
to  be  met  with  in  "  society,"  who  act  their  parts  to  the  life  and  lend  a 
piquant  charm  to  the  story. — Albany  Press. 

The  tone  of  the  book  is  fresh,  breezj^,  healthy.  It  is  so  frank  and 
natural  throughout  that  it  does  one  good  to  come  into  contact  with 
the  characters  who  figure  in  its  pages. —  Utica  Herald. 

A  story  which  will  find  many  readers,  because  it  is  written  in  a 
bright,  pleasant  style.  .  .  .  The  characters  are  skilfully  drawn  and 
the  narrative  well  managed. — Philadelphia  North  American. 

The  author  has  skilfully  contrasted  the  heroine  with  every  variety 
of  well-bred  aud  ill-bred  fashionables.  .  .  .  There  is  a  great  deal  of 
skilful  characterization  in  the  narrative,  and  much  sharp,  if  indirect, 
rebuke  of  current  shams. — Cincinnati  Gazette. 

The  story  is  carefully  finished  in  all  its  details,  and  h  Avell  adapt- 
ed to  afford  an  insight  into  the  various  phases  of  society  in  the  me- 
tropolis.— Rochester  Herald. 


Published  by  HARPER  &  BROTHERS,  New  York 

U;^  The  above  work  is  for  sale  by  all  booksellers,  or  will  be  sent  by  the 

publishers,  postage  prepaid,  on  receipt  of  the  price. 

2 


OLD  ISTEW  YOEK 


Reminiscences  of  an  Octogenaeian  of  the  City  of  'New 
York  (1816-1860).  By  Chas.  H.  Haswell.  With 
Portrait  of  the  Author,  Many  Illustrations,  and  a 
Map  of  ISTew  York  in  1816.  Crown  8vo,  Cloth,  Orna- 
mental, Uncut  Edges  and  Gilt  Top,  $3  00. 

This  very  clever  and  entertaining  book.  ...  A  book  which,  for 
its  pictures  alone,  is  a  study,  and  when  to  these  one  adds  the  simple 
yet  graphic  descriptions  of  an  observer  thorouglily  at  home  in  his 
subject,  and  qualified  by  many  experiences  to  write  knowingly  and 
spiritedly,  one  has  a  volume  which  is  not  only  delightful  to  read, 
but  valuable  ns  a  compendium  of  facts  of  real  importance  to  be  re- 
membered.— Churclimim,  N.  Y. 

Mr.  Haswell  has  been  a  close  observer  and  a  taker  of  notes,  and  an 
infinite  deal  of  lore  concerning  churches,  streets,  theatres,  and  per- 
sons is  crowded  into  the  well-indexed  x)ages  of  this  book. — Atlantic 
Monthly. 

By  far  the  most  interesting  of  recent  contributions  to  tlio  litera- 
ture of  Old  New  York.  .  .  .  The  book  is  an  exact  and  scholarly  record 
of  the  ground  it  covers.  It  is  a  valuable  addition  to  the  literature 
that  is  fast  proving  that  New  York,  whatever  may  have  been  the 
case  in  the  past,  no  longer  lacks  a  history. — Evangelist,  N.  Y. 

These  reminiscences  are  a  rare  accession  to  local  history,  and 
should  be  treasured  by  every  true  New  Yorker. — Jewish  Meaaengei', 
N.  Y. 

It  would  bo  diverting  to  go  on  quoting  from  Mr.  Has  well's  book, 
for  it  has  scarcely  a  page  on  which  some  such  interesting  incident  as 
the  above  is  not  described.  The  volume  is  a  perfect  mine  of  topo- 
graphical information.  It  lias  something  to  say  about  innumerable 
landmarks,  about  the  streets  and  their  names,  about  restaurants  and 
places  of  amusement  noted  in  their  day,  about  the  thousand  and  one 
things  which  gave  New  York  its  physiognomy,  about  the  thousand 
and  one  celebrities  who  were  prominent  in  the  making  of  the  city.  .  .  . 
It  is  a  book  to  dip  into  ;  one,  moreover,  in  which  the  casual  reader 
will  never  fail  to  iind  something  worth  having  paused  to  scan.  The 
illustrations  are  numerous,  well  chosen,  and  well  executed. — If.  Y, 
Tribune. 

Published  by  HARPER  &  BROTHERS,  New  York 

The  above  work  is  for  sale  by  all  booksellers,  or  loill  be  sent  by  the 
publishers,  postage  prepaid,  on  receipt  of  the  price. 


OLD  JSTEW  YOEK 


A  TouB  Around  IjTew  York,  and  My  Summer  Acre: 
being  the  Kecreations  of  Mr.  Felix  Oldboy.  By  John 
Flavel  Mines.  Illustrated.  Crown  8vo,  Cloth,  Orna- 
mental, $3  00. 

It  would  1)6  hard  indeed  to  find  anywhere  else  the  same  amount 
of  information  about  the  New  York  of  fifty  years  ago  as  is  crowded 
between  the  covers  of  this  book. — Examiner,  N.  Y. 

The  precision  of  the  historiographer  is  softened  by  the  grace  of 
the  lover  and  the  sentiment  of  the  poet;  and  the  charm  of  all  these 
lively  recollections  of  interesting  scenes,  personages,  and  events  can 
be  felt  throughout  the  entire  volume.  The  work  sparkles  with  anec- 
dotes and  pen-portraits. — Magazine  of  American  History, 

Colonel  Mines  was  the  most  congenial  of  enthusiasts,  and  so  his 
book  is  a  delightful  one. — N.  Y.  Times. 

In  Old  New  York.  By  Thomas  A.  Janvier.  With  13 
Maps  and  58  Illustrations.  Post  Svo,  Cloth,  Orna- 
mental, $1  75. 

To  all  curious  prowlers  about  the  city,  old  citizens  or  new-comers, 
we  heartily  commend  Mr.  Janvier's  book.  For  practical  use,  edifica- 
tion, and  entertainment,  no  book  on  the  subject  that  we  know  com- 
pares with  it. — N.  Y.  Evening  Post. 

Mr.  Janvier  has  presented  his  material  with  an  artist's  eye  for 
effect,  making  a  most  happily  conceived  and  skilfully  executed 
historical  monograph. — Advance,  Chicago. 

Overflows  with  all  sorts  of  minute  and  curious  information  con- 
cerning both  the  old  and  the  recent  town.  .  .  .  Mr.  Janvier  has  long 
been  a  zealous  and  sympathetic  student  of  this  subject.  His  text  is 
supplemented  with  numerous  maps  and  illustrations,  instructive  and 
interesting. — JV.  Y.  Sun. 

The  ITew  York  Yoltjnteer  Fire  Department.  By 
George  W.  Sheldon.  "With  145  Illustrations,  many 
of  which  are  taken  from  Old  Prints.  Square  Svo, 
Cloth,  Ornamental,  $4  50. 

No  old  "  institution "  of  New  York  offers  so  many  picturesque 
contrasts  and  romantic  incidents  in  the  course  of  its  history  as  this. 
Its  record  of  heroic  acts  and  notable  sacrifices  is  a  long  and  glorious 
one. — N.  Y.  Journal  of  Commerce. 


Published  by  HARPER  &  BROTHERS,  New  York 

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publishers,  postage  prepaid,  on  receipt  of  the  price. 
4 


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